Durango hardware business opens café, showroom with live blacksmithing

A cabinet knob, a latte and a working forge now share the same counter in southwest Durango. Nathaniel Winkler opened Blacksmith Café on April 1 at 21738 U.S. Highway 160, Unit A, turning his longtime Element Hardware business into a hybrid storefront built to be more than a “cold showroom.”

The shop combines a coffee bar, a hardware showroom and live metalwork, with Winkler’s wife, Johanna, running the café side day to day. Customers can watch pieces being made during open forging hours, and the business plans to add entry-level blacksmithing classes. The first two-hour class is scheduled for 3 p.m. on April 25 and costs $125 per person.

Winkler has spent years building the business around small architectural details he calls “functional art,” including knobs, handles, rods, hooks, toilet paper holders and towel rods. Element Hardware has operated since 2016, first out of a home shop Winkler built himself off Lightner Creek Road west of Durango. He had also sold handmade hardware online through Etsy, where he said he moved more than 150,000 pieces in 2024 alone and had worked on more than 100,000 kitchens.

The café menu is designed to be approachable for an everyday stop, not a special-occasion splurge. Coffee comes from Desert Sun Coffee Roasters, with non-coffee drinks such as smoothies and yerba maté alongside pastries and breakfast burritos from Odd Bird Baking Co. and Them Cakes Dough. Winkler said most 12-ounce drinks cost $3 to $4, while food items generally run from about $2 to $10. He also said the café takes cash tips only and does not prompt for credit-card tipping on counter-service purchases.

The new format fits a town where a small retail space has to do more than one job. Durango’s population was estimated at 19,811 in July 2024, up from 19,071 in the 2020 census, and the city’s retail base has long supported businesses that mix shopping with experience. For Winkler, that means a storefront that serves local customers, draws in curious passersby on U.S. Highway 160 and gives Element Hardware a public face after years as a mostly online operation.