Singer Leona Lewis, her husband Dennis Jauch, and their friend Achraf Sekhiri struggled to find a good vegan coffeehouse in L.A. – so they opened their own, Coffee and Plants. They’re on their second location and have plans for more.
Singer-songwriter Leona Lewis and her husband, choreographer and producer Dennis Jauch, were out in Los Angeles with their friend Achraf Sekhiri looking for a place to grab coffee. But they ran into a surprising issue: All three follow a plant-based diet, and in a city littered with cafes and coffeehouses, they couldn’t find a strictly vegan spot.
“[There was a] lack of options,” Jauch said. “We essentially realized that there wasn’t a great market for plant-based milk or shops. So we decided to do it ourselves.”
In 2019, they opened their first Coffee and Plants cafe in Old Town Pasadena. This April, they expanded to Studio City. In both locations, the food and drinks are 100% plant-based. All the coffee drinks, from the cortado to the cappuccino, are made with almond or oat milk, and the lattes feature homemade syrups. Treats, like the almond cherry muffin and chocolate croissant, are vegan, as are the breakfast and lunch options like the avocado tartine and the JustEgg and cheese croissant sandwich.
The Studio City cafe, like the Pasadena one, is a hyper-feminine pink and green wonderland infused with cottagecore and European influence (Jauch hails from Germany, Lewis from England, and Sekhiri from the Netherlands). Baby-pink booths and bright-pink tables invite customers to linger a while. Plants – many of which are for sale – line the walls on floating shelves. Jauch said that the color palette was chosen for a reason: Pink has a welcoming aura, while green honors their plant-based business model.
“When you step into our shop, it’s an entire experience that we wanted to create,” Jauch said. “We wanted it to have a natural organic feel to make people feel good, to make people feel like they want to stay in the environment for a long time. We have loads of people in the community, families coming down and chilling at our store, and it’s really beautiful to see how the community has already welcomed us.”
“We want to disrupt that Starbucks model,” Jauch said, “and bring a more sustainable choice to the people.”
Coffee and Plants’ commitment to eco-friendly practices goes beyond their vegan offerings, too. For every 100 cups of coffee sold, the cafe plants a tree with the National Forest Foundation; so far, they’ve planted nearly 3,000 trees through this program.
“Giving back was going to be at the core of this entire thing,” Jauch said. “We said, if we make our passion for coffee another business, it needs to be doing something good for our planet.”
Currently, the cafe uses takeout cups that are lined with plant-based plastic and compostable straws. Eventually, though, they plan to phase out single-use cups for a reusable cup model to achieve near-zero waste. “We’re also currently developing our own plant-based milks, so we’ll be stepping away from pre-made milks, which unfortunately carry a lot of artificial ingredients,” he added.
Jauch, Lewis and Sekhiri plan to open three more locations in the Los Angeles area in the next two years, with the long-term goal of opening shops throughout the U.S. and Europe.
“We want to disrupt that Starbucks model,” Jauch said, “and bring a more sustainable choice to the people.”
Coffee and Plants is located at 62 W. Union St. in Pasadena and 12334 Ventura Blvd. in Studio City. Hours for both locations can be found on their Instagram.
