A music note is mounted over the door of the corner building at 23rd Avenue and Jackson Street. For four years nothing happened under it. A Starbucks opened there in 1997 and closed in 2022, a later plan to put a different coffee shop in the space never opened, and the building stood empty. Seattle magazine covered that history in October.
You can buy a latte there again. The new tenant runs on a model that shows up across the neighborhood this fall. The new café trains apprentices, the coffee shop a few blocks north has kept its drip price where it was even as its bean costs climbed, the new grocery up the hill is a member-owned co-op, and nearly everything on the Central District's November calendar is free or needs only an RSVP.
The music note over the door at 2300 S Jackson
Coffee TAB moved into 2300 S Jackson St in September. It is the nonprofit's third café, after its Pioneer Square and Belltown locations. The menu is the usual run of espresso drinks and pastries. Behind the counter, the café doubles as a workforce program. According to Seattle magazine, Coffee TAB hires young people who have faced barriers to employment, many referred by nonprofits that run youth shelters or work with young people leaving foster care, and trains them as apprentices over eight to 12 weeks. The training covers everything from deep-cleaning the shop to pouring latte art. Since 2023, 25 apprentices have finished the program. Some stayed on as baristas and others took the experience elsewhere.
Coffee TAB hadn't been looking for this corner. Founder Johnathan Tran told Seattle magazine that Fulcrum and La Marzocco, which supply the nonprofit's beans and espresso equipment, approached him about the space. He said a third café would move people through the program's growing waitlist faster, and that he knew the building's past as a community focal point. The name comes from "tabernacle," which Tran traces to words meaning "tent" or "dwelling place." As he told the magazine, "We are trying to create a place where we can foster dwelling and a place where people can meet."
So the corner has a café again, and whatever you spend there also pays for a training slot.
Ten years at 23rd and Union, and a drip coffee still near $3.75
About half a mile north, Squirrel Chops has just reached ten years. The coffee shop and two-chair salon sits just west of 23rd and Union in The Central, one of the first new buildings at that intersection. Capitol Hill Seattle Blog marked the anniversary on October 29.
Co-owner Shirley Henderson told CHS that green coffee prices rose about 120 percent after poor harvests in Brazil and Vietnam. The shop's drip coffee has stayed near $3.75 anyway, which means a small loss on each cup. Henderson explained the choice in the same article:
"I want something that people can access."
Sera Cahoone, a barista at the shop for nearly ten years, gave CHS the practical reason: "If you go too high, people just won't do it. They'll make it at home."
The house espresso comes from Thin Man, roasted by a longtime friend of Henderson's who now roasts essentially just for this shop. Retail bags come from roasters including Stamp Act. The shop's events are coming back too. A recent art show by barista Nazira started the revival, chef Becky Selengut has a cookbook signing planned for December, and "Gay Friday" is due to return. Co-owner Sharon Blyth-Moss summed up the space for CHS: "It's become that place where people meet people."
Between the two corners, a $3.75 cup at 23rd and Union and a latte that helps pay for an apprentice's training at 23rd and Jackson keep a seat in either café inexpensive.
Up the hill on E Madison, a co-op and a cafe
The Central District's eastern edge climbs into Madison Valley, which has gained two new places to shop and eat this fall.
PCC Community Markets opened its Madison Valley store at 2925 E Madison St in mid-October, on the ground floor of The Arbory, an 82-unit apartment building. Capitol Hill Seattle Blog reported that the project took about a decade, on the former City People's garden shop site. It's PCC's 17th store. The 73-year-old co-op has more than 125,000 members and calls itself the largest consumer-owned food cooperative in the country. The store carries organic produce, meat and seafood, house-made sushi, a prepared-foods deli, and a pizza program made with organic flour from Cairnspring Mills in the Skagit Valley. Bulk goods and store-brand items cover lower-priced staples. About 75 union staff work there.
One detail affects anyone driving that stretch of Madison. The approved design put the loading dock inside the building and kept delivery trucks on E Madison. Deliveries are supposed to arrive in scheduled windows, in smaller straight-body trucks that pull into the enclosed bay and close the roll-up door. Customer traffic and deliveries use the Madison entrance, and residents' parking is reached from Dewey Place.
A short walk west, Girdie's Cafe has opened at 2811 E Madison St in the former Cagette space. It serves Spanish-influenced food and drinks, and Eater Seattle added it to its new-restaurant heat map in October.
The rest of November, by date and by price
The calendar follows the same pattern as the cafés. Most of what's left this month costs nothing to attend.
| Date | What | Where | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sat., Nov. 14 | Holiday Welding Night: Welded Ornament | Pratt Fine Arts Center | Registration through Pratt |
| Sun., Nov. 15, 7 p.m. | Elena Dudum with Ijeoma Oluo, a LANGSTON program | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Ave | Free |
| Sat., Nov. 21 | Forged Candle Holder workshop | Pratt Fine Arts Center | Registration through Pratt |
| Sun., Nov. 22 | Block-print holiday workshop | Pratt Fine Arts Center | Registration through Pratt |
| Sun., Nov. 22, noon to 3 p.m. | Jimi Hendrix Celebration | Northwest African American Museum, 2300 S Massachusetts St | RSVP |
| Mon., Nov. 23, 6 p.m. | Black Futures Book Club | LANGSTON | Free |
| Tue., Nov. 24, 7:30 p.m. | Scope Screenings, "Seattle's Underground Film Festival" | LANGSTON | $18 early, $22 general |
The main event is on the 22nd. The Northwest African American Museum's Jimi Hendrix Celebration runs Sunday afternoon with a live performance by Claytin Hendrix, food from West Coast Seattle Boy, an interactive craft station with Imani Sims, and a raffle of Jimi Hendrix merchandise. NAAM asks guests to RSVP through the form on its events page.
The Dudum talk is the only item on the list held outside the neighborhood. LANGSTON is co-presenting it at the bookstore on 10th Avenue. Dudum will discuss her debut memoir, They Told Me Back Home Would Be Beautiful. The rest of LANGSTON's calendar stays at its home venue in the CD. The Black Futures Book Club picks one title a month, centering foundational authors, and meets on the fourth Monday. Scope Screenings runs on the last Tuesday of every month through January 26.
Pratt Fine Arts Center's 2026 holiday workshop page lists the three November sessions above. Times and registration details are on Pratt's site.
December on the same corners
Most of these places run on a monthly cycle, so the same addresses fill the first weeks of December.
- Wednesday, Dec. 2, 6 p.m.: Unite, LANGSTON's free monthly BIPOC improv jam, open to every skill level.
- Dec. 5, 6, 9, 10 and 12: another round of holiday workshops at Pratt Fine Arts Center.
- Sometime in December: Becky Selengut's cookbook signing at Squirrel Chops.
- Monday, Dec. 28, and Tuesday, Dec. 29: the year's last Black Futures Book Club and Scope Screenings at LANGSTON.
Coffee TAB is pouring espresso at 23rd and Jackson, and Squirrel Chops is still pouring drip at about $3.75 at 23rd and Union.
At PBNW Homes, we follow the Central District corner by corner because that's how neighbors use it, from the morning coffee stop to the Sunday afternoon at NAAM. If you'd like to talk about what's changing around 23rd Avenue or up on E Madison, Work With Us. We're happy to compare notes over a cup at one of the shops above.
