Poppies and Poursteady at Intelligentsia’s New Hollywood Bar

The terrazzo-clad bar of the new Intelligentsia Coffee location at Hollywood and Cahuenga Blvds in Hollywood. Photo by Wonho Frank Lee, courtesy of Intelligentsia.

Twelve years after first coming to Los Angeles with a coffee bar in Silver Lake that would prove to be hugely influential to the area’s craft coffee movement, Chicago-based Intelligentsia Coffee has opened its fourth LA coffee bar, in Hollywood.

The company’s 14th coffee bar throughout Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Boston, Intelli Hollywood is the first to offer matcha and chai tea lattes available on tap, while it also taps sparkling teas and cold brew. Aside from Intelligentsia’s traditional espresso offerings, pourovers of hot coffees are mechanically prepared with a Poursteady unit.

Mr. Holmes Bakehouse provides sweet and savory pastries, plus sandwiches served all day.

Intelligentsia has turned to existing partner Mr. Holmes Bakehouse for food offerings, including creative pastry items like a churro croissant or a manchego pastrami croissant, as well as a range of savory sandwiches that are available all day.

At the intersection of Hollywood and Cahuenga Boulevards, the 38-person shop sits on the site of the former estate of French painter Paul De Longpré, whose paintings focused almost exclusively on precise replicas of flowers in watercolors.

LA-based design firm Standard, Intelligentsia’s architect for the project, said it was inspired by the history of the site, with colored mosaic tiles throughout the vaulted ceilings serving as an abstraction of poppy fields.

Paul de Longpré house and garden, formerly located at Hollywood Boulevard and Cahuenga Avenue, in Hollywood, California. Public domain photo.

Guests enter the shop through an outdoor patio with terrazo benches, flower beds, and a flower-motif wall graphic. Inside the shop, dark stained wood-paneled walls and furniture are contrasted by stainless steel and fluted mirrors, along with the 30-foot terrazzo-clad bar. Standard described the seating as “arranged like a subway car parallel to the bar.”

“The specialty coffee scene has seen rapid growth throughout the greater Los Angeles area and we have been looking to expand our brand within the perfect neighborhood,” Intelligentsia President and CEO James McLaughlin said in an announcement of the opening. “Hollywood boasts a rich cultural history and allows us to bring Intelligentsia to locals, tourists, and the growing business community.”

Photo by Wonho Frank Lee, courtesy of Intelligentsia.

Intelligentsia plans to open at least two more shops in 2019, including its first location in Austin, Texas, and a bar at the upcoming retro-inspired TWA Hotel at JFK Airport in New York.

Photo by Wonho Frank Lee, courtesy of Intelligentsia.

Intelligentsia Hollywood is now open at 6401 Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles.