Happy Home Coffee, the new specialty coffee shop anchoring a redeveloped stretch of downtown Des Moines, was a long time coming for co-owner and head roaster Eliot Parker. After four years of building the brand at farmers’ markets, through wholesale accounts and grocery stores, the team finally found a brick-and-mortar home in a lobby space at the new Mezzo that mirrors their ambitions for community and craft.
“We love coffee, we love people and we love how coffee is a means of connecting people,” Parker said. “You can’t really do coffee alone. You do coffee with people.”
For him, a café is more than a place to grab a latte. It’s a “third space” where people can work, stick around and feel like part of the Walnut Loop neighborhood in downtown Des Moines.
The coffee shop anchors the new Mezzo, located in downtown’s historic 25-story Financial Center at 606 Walnut St. The upscale residential conversion features 209 luxury studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments, priced between $1,200 and $3,000 per month, alongside street-level retail, the coffee shop and a gym.
Parker envisions Happy Home as a true neighborhood café for the emerging Walnut Loop area, where new apartments are filling in upstairs in the building and in nearby towers. “I’m very much hoping for this to be like a neighborhood cafe as this area develops more into more of a neighborhood,” he said. “I’m really hoping that we cultivate more of a neighborhood vibe down here that people can walk around this area, get a great cup of coffee, get lunch, see other human beings and foster a walkable community down here. Maybe some genuine urban living in Iowa would be pretty cool.”
What does Happy Home look like?
The space itself reinforces that ambition. Set in a generous lobby with high ceilings and an array of seating, it’s designed for staying, not churning customers. “Anybody can come in here. You can stay here as long as you want. You can sit here after hours if you want,” Parker said.
The lobby offers “seating for every possible need,” from living-room-style groupings to hideaway corners and laptop-friendly chairs. “I feel like there’s got to be a chair for everybody here.”
Happy Home also plays into the momentum of a changing downtown. Construction still lines the streets around the building, but Parker says the early foot traffic has been surprisingly encouraging. “This feels very urban. This feels so good to have people walking, sitting down, having coffee. The more people we can attract, the better.”
Outside the café’s doors, a nearby park with tennis, pickleball and basketball courts gives Happy Home another way to connect. Customers can borrow balls and rackets from the shop and then return for coffee or, eventually, patio seating. “I think we can make a really vibrant area full of food and bev,” Parker said.
Behind the bar, Happy Home is driven by Parker’s roasting philosophy and deep farm relationships, especially in Honduras. “We are very much a specialty coffee roaster,” he said. “Our job is not to create flavor. We’re supposed to curate coffees and do our best to express them the best that we can, as they are based on their cultivar and the soil they’re grown in, and the farmer who put their heart and soul into it. So we’re just here not to ruin it and express it in its best way.”
Parker is also keenly aware that younger customers demand transparency about sourcing, quality and ethics. “People are less willing to purchase slop these days,” he said, noting parallels between coffee and the growing scrutiny around matcha. “The way I see it is coffee is a big supply chain and there’s just a lot of different steps where it can be messed up,” from processing to importing to roasting to the final experience with a barista. At Happy Home, he wants every link in that chain to align with the name over the door.
Happy Home is Parker’s first café built from the ground up, but not his first time running a coffee shop. Parker worked for years at Mars Cafe in Des Moines’ Drake neighborhood, roasting its coffee before ultimately buying the business.
What to order at Happy Home
Happy Home’s menu leans into third-wave coffee while staying accessible to anyone accustomed to a more mainstream drive-thru chain. “If you’re a big coffee nerd, I think you’ll like us,” Parker said. “We’re trying to kind of bridge the gap between third-wave coffee shop and people who go to Scooters every day. I’m really hoping there’s some stuff here that they’ll like too.”
The lineup starts with a core espresso menu — think straight shots, Americanos, cappuccinos and lattes built on lighter-roasted coffees that showcase the terroir.
The shop offers pour-overs and iced lattes, as well. Those who care about the details will find beans roasted in-house and a rotating selection of single-origin coffees, including limited-run offerings from outside their Honduran core.
House-made syrups add flavor without sacrificing quality, but one of Happy Home’s signature touches is a playful, textural top for cold drinks called cloud tops. “It’s almost like a cold foam, except it’s a bit more fluffy and structurally stable, and it’s all dairy-free. It’s like a meringue. It’s really fun.” Expect those cloud tops to rotate often as the bar team experiments: “That’s going to be kind of one of our creative outlets, our froufrou kind of menu,” he added.
Non-coffee drinkers will find a serious tea and matcha program. Parker is particularly proud of the matcha sourced from True Tea in Portland, Oregon: “It’s a first flush, first harvest matcha. You’d be hard pressed to find that in a coffee shop,” he said.
For anyone planning to camp out with a laptop or simply treat the café as their neighborhood canteen, there’s a small but thoughtful selection of savory and sweet pastry items. Happy Home serves Australian pies from Pie Mates, turning the shop into a viable lunch stop, alongside pastries from Scenic Route, delivered each morning.
Taken together, the menu reflects Parker’s belief that every detail — from the farm in Honduras to the foam on top of an iced latte — contributes to a customer’s experience. “Any cup of coffee tastes bad in association with a negative experience,” he said.
At Happy Home, the goal is the opposite: a carefully sourced, carefully roasted, carefully served cup that lives up to its name and gives downtown Des Moines another reason to linger.
Where to find Happy Home Coffee
Happy Home also sells its coffee beans in Hy-Vee stores in the Des Moines metro.
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Susan Stapleton is the entertainment editor and dining reporter at The Des Moines Register. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, or drop her a line at sstapleton@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: How Happy Home Coffee is building a true third place in downtown Des Moines
Reporting by Susan Stapleton, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Susan Stapleton, Des Moines Register | USA TODAY Network
