PORTLAND, Maine — Coffee pilgrims will have to wait a few more months to see what a futuristic java joint looks like. Portland roaster Coffee By Design has delayed the opening of its new Diamond Street cafe until March.
“We have fixtures still being built, product selections to finalize, folks traveling to coffee farms for harvest,” said owner Mary Allen Lindemann.
The flagship cafe anchoring Coffee By Design’s new East Bayside headquarters was slated to open in mid-January. Touted as “ a playground for coffee,” the cafe will showcase new brewing methods, custom blends and become a test kitchen for coffee extractions.
“All the equipment is installed and a blending station is being worked on right now,” said Lindemann, who hired Artas Designs of Biddeford to create a customized unit where customers can mix and match their own beans.
In December the company shifted its entire roasting operation from Washington Avenue to the sprawling 24,000-square-foot space. The interactive cafe, where customers will be able to see roasters at work, is the biggest expansion for the 20-year-old company that began in a small shop on Congress Street.
Though a few streets away, the Washington Avenue cafe will remain open and eventually expand into the space the roasters vacated said Lindemann.
Coffee By Design’s fifth cafe is ready to go, with sparkling new machines like the Modbar in place, but Lindemann wants to “make sure our team is trained. We could open now, the equipment is there, but the whole store is not up to our standards,” she said. “Everyone will be much more relaxed if we delay a bit longer in order to do it properly.”