A neighborhood coffee house, three times over
Nora and Theo opened Tamp on Milwaukee Avenue in 2019 with one espresso machine and a used roaster.
How it started
In 2019 Nora was pulling shots in other people’s cafés and Theo was fixing espresso machines all over Chicago. They kept meeting over the same broken grinders and kept having the same conversation: why is good coffee so often served in a hurry, by people who never get to learn your name?
So they rented a narrow room on Milwaukee Avenue, bought one espresso machine and a used roaster from a bakery that was closing, and opened with six stools and a chalkboard menu. That first winter they roasted on Sunday nights and handed the extra bags to the neighbors.
We still roast in the back of that Logan Square café, twice a week, in small batches you can smell from the sidewalk. We taste every batch before it leaves the room, and if it isn’t right, it doesn’t go in your cup.
The idea hasn’t changed: a short menu made carefully, a barista who remembers your order, and a room you want to stay in. Most of the faces behind the bar have been with us for years, and plenty of them know your order before you say it.
Three cafés later, we’re still a neighborhood coffee house. Thank you for every early morning, every “the usual, please” and every cup you’ve let us make for you.
Nora & Theo
Six years, three cafés
One café a year or two, never faster than we could keep the coffee right.
The people behind the bar
Forty baristas across three cafés, led by these three.
Nora Hale
Co-founder, head of coffee
Theo Grant
Co-founder, operations
Ana Ruiz
Head roaster