Surprise… Amante: an attractive alternative
Overcome the barriers of cramped appearance and the over-the-top Eurotrash facade and you’ll find Amante downtown a surprisingly pleasant place to work.
Amante scores well on the essentials: great coffee, solid wireless service, and decent outlet distribution. Plus, being on the classier side of things (on the surface at least), Amante gets a good flow of the Boulder beautiful.
Push a few of the tables along the bench together and you can get the entire staff within scone-sharing range. And the seats are possibly the most comfortable in the entire c-shop scene.
Now for the drawbacks…
High granite, classy, bright … it’s Saxy’s
Saxy’s is the latest entrant on the Boulder coffeeworkshop scene and is this author’s new fave. Unfortunately it didn’t take long for word to get out as all the Trident patrons have fled the dark dankness of T for Saxy’s open classiness. Within the first few weeks of Saxy’s opening you could get a table. Two days ago there were no fewer than ten laptops on the central counter and every table along the glass west wall had at least two laptops. That’s unfortunate. Damn masses.
The overwhelming early popularity is a problem for me, but what brings me back is the excellent tea selection, excellent coffee quality (compare to Vics — yuk!), and the style. What shies me away is the astronomical prices (compare to Vics — har har). Over $4 for a mocha? Are you kidding? Eight dollar sandwiches? What do you think this is, Manhattan?
Bonus: if the girls recognize you as a regular you’re only going to pay for 2/3 of your coffees.
Location: 10th Between Pearl and Spruce
The glassy Vics
What is it about Vics downtown? The Allegro coffee is mediocre at best, the pastry offerings are even worse (nothing approaches the Kitchen’s chocolate croissant, but still….). The atmosphere doesn’t exist, except for the plastic and sterile floors. The wifi goes down every 10 or 20 minutes.
For me, though, the work environment can’t be beat. Big tables – big enough for six that you usually get all to yourself. Bright, open, lots of glass (compare to the claustrophobic closet environment of Laughing Goat). The prices are cheap and get cheaper after noon (well, the pastries go down). And the place clears out after about 1pm, so you can have the whole damn place to yourself.
The only danger here is that Mike isn’t getting enough business to pay his rent, which I can only assume is skyhigh (prime spot despite the lack of car or bike parking). I work at Vics because it’s either empty or only moderately full (again, compare to the Goat – what the hell are you people thinking?) so I’m trying to do my part by getting down there on afternoons.
Location: Broadway just north of Canyon
