Boutique Coffee Roaster Coperaco's First Cafe Holds a Modern Tree House

Coperaco, a celebrated New York-based roaster, opens its first U.S. cafe in Harrison, New Jersey—and it's a stunner.

Serving as the ground-floor lobby of Harrison Urby, a lifestyle-oriented rental complex, Coperaco's first U.S. cafe is dripping with lush foliage. Founder Johan Pesenti collaborated closely with Amsterdam-based architecture and interiors firm Concrete to create an idyllic sanctuary where patrons can savor the high-quality, carefully-roasted brew.

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"We wanted to have an open space, lit by natural light, where you have the feeling of being in a greenhouse," Pesenti explains. The coffee created by Coperaco—which can be found at some of the world’s best restaurants and hotels—is hand-roasted in small batches, and focused on the farming and harvesting of the fruit, so creating a connection to the earth was essential to the design of the cafe.

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A vertical batten dripping with fronds encloses the heavy, under-lit marble coffee bar. Mosaic floor tiling grounds the space as barn framework fuses the indoor and outdoor elements. Airy, cascading lighting melds with hanging ivy throughout the space. 

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Adding further to the cafe’s outdoor theme is a two-story tree house built inside the space. Made of wood with a wall of braided rope, the structure adds cozy seating, a library, and a fireplace. Furnished with sleek midcentury-style furniture, it's a transformative space. One certainly does feel as if they are in the Garden State. 

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Project Credits:

-Architecture, Interior and Landscape design: concrete

-Executive Architect, Executive Landscape Architect: Minno and Wasko

-Structural Engineer: Mulhern + Kulp

-Client: Ironstate Development, Pegasus Group USA

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