An apartment building at Kenmore and Lawrence avenues, a short walk from Broadway. Photo: Warren LeMay from Chicago, IL, United States, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
The old Starbucks corner in the Bridgeview Bank building has a late-night tenant now. Queen Yemeni Coffee is open at 4753 N. Broadway, at Lawrence Avenue, a short walk from the Lawrence Red Line station and the neighborhood’s theaters.
Block Club Chicago reported in April that the cafe, which already had a Libertyville shop, planned to open May 20 in the landmark building and wanted to stay open until at least 11 p.m. Manager and co-owner Abdullah Monssar told the newsroom the name, logo and mural take after the Queen of Sheba, and that the shop would serve cardamom-spiced Yemeni coffees, spiced lattes, teas, smoothies and breakfast items, with beans sourced from Yemen.
“Ethiopia and Yemen are the first people who started the coffee business,” Monssar said then. “It is an opportunity to have a different taste than Starbucks or Dunkin.” He also said the corner, close to the Riviera and the Aragon, was the right place to catch regulars and concertgoers who wanted to sit down after a show. “Many people want a late-night cafe. This corner is busy, so we want to make it alive.”
The cafe’s Uptown location page now lists hours that start at 5 a.m. on weekdays and 6 a.m. on weekends, and run to midnight or 1 a.m., later than the 11 p.m. target Monssar first described. The listed phone number is 773-293-6065.
For a stretch of Broadway that already stays up late when the theaters let out, a coffeehouse that is open after the last encore is a practical change, not just a new menu.
