Indigo & Cloth

Bailies on espresso, guest roasters on filter

The coffee program has always been the reason to pause before climbing the stairs into the design store above. Espresso has run through a house blend from Bailies Coffee Roasters in Belfast, while the filter side keeps two single origins in play and brings in seasonal guest roasters. That rotation has included Nomad from Barcelona, Origin from Cornwall, and La Cabra from Denmark, with coffees moving between espresso, batch brew, and brewed-to-order filter rather than sitting as a fixed house list. The bar has worked with a two-group La Marzocco Linea for espresso, an EK43 for grinding, and a Marco Systems SP9 for filter. The SP9 matters here because it gives the metal V60 brew a steady, repeatable pour, while still keeping the order in the filter lane. Retail beans sit naturally in the same room as the clothes, ceramics, fragrance, and homewares.

A small ground-floor bar inside the store

The café occupies the left side of the ground floor, visible from the glass front, with the retail side running along the right and the staircase leading up to menswear, homewares, and lifestyle goods. It is not a long-settle room. Seating is compact: a small pavement bench, a two-person window bar, a narrow table with stools, and a couple of stools near the retail counter. The wall menu sits by the counter, the cake case is close to the till, and the whole exchange feels built around one good cup before or after a browse. Drinks have been served on wooden trays, with espresso in Kinto pottery and water alongside it. That detail fits the place, careful but not fussy. Come for a short coffee rather than a laptop session, and take the seat that opens first.

Order the filter first

Start with the filter. If there is a brewed-to-order option on the SP9, take that over defaulting to espresso, because the house puts its clearest effort into rotating single origins and filter service. When batch brew is on, it can be the right call if the origin suits the day; a naturally processed Ethiopian from Bailies has appeared in that role before, kept warm in a flask rather than made cup by cup. Espresso is the steadier order, especially when a guest single origin is running, as with La Divina from El Salvador roasted by Nomad. The case beside the counter carries cakes, but the better first decision is coffee-led: filter for range, espresso for pace, beans to take home if the roaster on the shelf catches your eye.