Another New Downtown Art’s District Mural Heralds Zinc Cafe’s Arrival
The Downtown Los Angeles Arts District has another new mural on its newest restaurant-to-be, Zinc Cafe at 580 Mateo, across the street from Handsome Coffee. Scheduled to open in January 2014, Zinc Cafe features lacto-ova and vegan food–think California/Mediterranean cuisine with salads, grains, vegetables, paninis and small pizzas, plus pastries and desserts. The menu is designed to be as enticing to carnivores as it is to vegetarians–even the most rabid cow-muncher will find tasty ways to enjoy vegetables!
Unlike the other three Zinc Cafes located in Orange County and north San Diego County beach communities, the Downtown version will have a full bar, and according to the Los Angeles Downtown News, owner John Secretan is working with a bar consultant to design specialty cocktails. Along with a wine bar and coffee bar, and seating shared with Handsome Coffee, guests can escape to the urban oasis garden with fountains and plants that Secretan has planned for the properties’ asphalt lot.
Secretan is also planning on maintaining Zinc Cafe’s Willow Street wall as
changeable wall.
a constantly evolving urban canvas. The Willow Street plywall siding which Secretan has left intact is already reworked and repainted almost daily it seems, and Secretan feels this is part of the nature of the Arts District.
When CARTWHEEL passed by Zinc Cafe’s location, we saw a mural, adjacent to one of RISK’s, being created by Set the Pace Foundation. Anthony from STPLA.org who sent us the top image of the mural explained Set the Pace’s mission:
We reach out to at risk youth and are available for community beautification projects. We’ve held workshops at boys homes and a high school in Watts. We also run the Venice Art Walls.
Zinc Cafe is embracing the artistic impulses of the Downtown Los Angeles Arts District, and working to enhance Arts District life for current residents and the newcomers anticipated for the massive One Santa Fe residential and retail project currently under construction.
Set the Pace Foundation’s Venice Art Wall murals:
