Gloom Coffee opens Pioneer Square café with in-house roasting and playful drinks
Gloom Coffee turned Pioneer Square’s old Elm space into a bright, hybrid café-roastery, with a Probat L12, table service and an espresso tonic built from lime husks.
Pioneer Square’s newest coffee stop is leaning hard into the opposite of its name. Gloom Coffee opened its first shop in the former Elm Coffee Roasters space at 240 2nd Ave S #103, and the result is a compact, color-forward room built to do more than pour cups. It is part roastery, part café, part small-stage for drinks that look as considered as they taste.
The 1,600-square-foot shop is split into two clear functions: a little more than half the footprint is devoted to roasting, anchored by a Probat L12, while the rest serves customers who want fast drip and espresso or a seat with table service. That balance says a lot about where Seattle café culture is headed. The roaster is no longer hidden in the back room, and the drink list is doing as much branding as the bag labels.
That menu gives Gloom its personality. One of the standout drinks is the Supersonic Espresso Tonic, built with sage-lime cordial, pear juice, espresso and tonic, a combination that pushes the café beyond the standard utility-first cup. Another nonalcoholic drink on the menu, called the (Head Shoulders) Bees and Toes, continues that playful line. Gloom also plans to launch an NA cocktail menu very soon, extending the same ideas into the evening-style beverage lane that has become a calling card for ambitious independent cafés.
The concept did not arrive overnight. Gloom says its founders, Alex Sciarrotta, Nate Reppert, Josh Modisette and Brandon Paul Weaver, began shaping the project in early 2023. Over the last decade, the four have worked as baristas, sales reps, competitors, coaches, roasters and café owners, and Gloom says those experiences shaped a business focused on improving coffee workers’ quality of life and offering strong pay and benefits.
The opening also gives Pioneer Square another daytime anchor at a familiar address. Elm Coffee Roasters had previously occupied the space before a transition to new ownership, and Gloom now inherits both the location and the neighborhood’s need for places that pull people in before lunch and keep them there a while. In a district shaped by offices, coworking and foot traffic, Gloom’s bright name, serious roasting setup and cocktail-minded drinks feel tuned to the moment. It is a coffee shop that knows the next phase of café culture is not just about caffeine, but about giving regulars a reason to linger.
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