Happy Coffee aims to help writers

Coffee and reading have always gone hand in hand. But the folks at Happy Coffee are bringing them together in a way that most people probably haven't seen before. They're teaming up with the Metro Denver Promotion of Letters organization and bringing you the best of coffee and writing.

It started out as a vision for a coffee shop like nothing else out there. The pairing up with MDPL just seemed right for everyone involved.

"First and foremost we're just trying to make amazing coffee, and everything else comes after that," Dustin Fuchtman, Partner and Manager of Happy Coffee said. "We're really trying to do something different and push the envelope for what a coffee shop is." And they are doing just that, in more ways than one.

They've created a place where people can come together to enjoy a cup of coffee, in an environment designed to get customers to interact and just maybe get to know someone new.

In order for this to happen, the folks at Happy Coffee needed a space that was conducive to the environment they wanted to create. "It's going to be a very open, inviting space. The people that want to be in the background can be, but we are gonna make it to where they have to find those places," Fuchtman said.

So, when the opportunity to take over the old Fancy Tiger space on Broadway and Ellsworth came, they seized it. The location and the building alone made the space ideal for the Happy Coffee vision to become a reality.

Another unique aspect to Happy Coffee is that they will have a basement area which they are subletting to the MDPL organization, an organization designed to assist the youth in Denver to discover the joys of writing.

"Our mission is to provide young writers in the Denver area with a supportive community and creative opportunities to express themselves through writing," said Jenny Hekkers, MDPL board member.

Through the organization, the MDPL reaches out to youth in the community through writing and writing workshops.

The MDPL space will not only be for their students attending workshops, or for MDPL activities; they are also offering the space for anyone in the community that might need a place to come together to work or study.

"It is going to be a space for kids when the kids are there. It's also going to be a space for people who need space to meet," said Laura Levi, MDPL board member. "We want it to be accessible for anyone who needs it. It's going to be conducive for people who need to work at a desk area individually, or to meet as a group collectively in the center of the space. The space won't have a conference room feel, but it will have the function of a conference room."

Up until now, the MDPL didn't have a designated space where they could hold their workshops and summer camps, and they would collaborate with numerous organizations in the Denver metro area, including CU Denver.

"The UCD writing center partnered with us to house our summer writing camps for the last three summers. This year we are hoping to have the base camp here at Happy Coffee."

It has been a long wait for the MDPL organization when it came to finding a space they could call their own, so when the people at Happy Coffee offered them the space they couldn't turn it down.

The space not only provides the MDPL with a place they can call home, but it will also provide them with an area that is perfect to give back to their community.

"This relationship with Happy Coffee is a blessing because they know what we do, and they know the impact we have and our ability to reach out to the community and engage kids in creative writing and creative outlets for writing," Levi said. "It's ideal for us because we need space, and we want to make our space available and usable to the community that surrounds us, so it seems like a natural fit."

The space will provide the MDPL environment necessary to have a positive impact on a child's life. They will be able to conduct their workshops and everyone involved can benefit.

"We want kids to be in a supportive environment where they can write and express themselves through writing, Hekkers said. "So we do all kinds of cool workshops like comic books, mystery writing, factual fairy tails, fiction, short stories, and poetry."

The workshops are primarily for 7 to 14 year olds; however, even with the age differences the MDPL still conducts their workshops as a group.

"We don't segregate the kids according to age because we believe that they feed off each other in a sense," Levi said. "The older kids tend to mentor the younger kids, and everyone seems to get something out of it in the end."

Signing your children up for workshops with MDPL is free and all they ask is for a $25 deposit that is fully refundable after the workshop. Some families have been known to roll over their deposit so that their child can partake in several workshops and others are generous enough to donate their deposit to help those families that might not be able to afford it.

The MDPL will have a sign-up board where individuals, groups, or organizations can sign up to use the space as soon as they are open for business, and the MDPL would ask for a donation to reserve the space.

"It will be open to the public, and ideally it will be you reserve the space with a donation to our nonprofit," Levi said. "We haven't discussed a cost, but it is to secure the space for you when you need it."

Happy Coffee set out to change the way Denver buys their coffee. What they came up with was an idea that will make a difference in the community in more ways than one. Together with the MDPL they will develop a space where students of all ages can come together to write and learn from one another all in the same place.