The Bronte Sisters’ Birthplace is a Bustling Coffeehouse
By 
Coffeehouses have long been a gathering place for those who crave caffeine, music, a space for writing, or philosophical thought. Perhaps those of us who love to sip a cuppa joe in a coffeehouse revel in the ability of such a building’s walls to deem cool what, in other places, might seem a little nerdy.
Where would the Viennese philosophical culture have blossomed, or the folk music scene in The Village been welcomed, if not for coffeehouses?
In interviewing creative women for this blog, I have noticed this is a theme that consistently pops up in our conversations.
Outside of good coffee, cafes are the quintessential “third place” that serves as the gathering place for community, art, and music which sated my creative and entrepreneurial side, so that became my professional journey for 15 years: working in, and running coffee shops all around the US!
(Stacie, Forest City Stained Glass)
I can relate to this love affair with coffeehouses. With their ability to nourish creative and intelligent conversation and fuel it all with one’s choice of caffeine – whether it be black coffee or a vanilla latte.
For years, if I wasn’t behind the counter serving lattes, I was drinking Earl Grey with milk and devouring novels on the patio. Now that I spend most of my time with my four-year-old and five-month-old, there is a part of me that longs to be there again.
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
(The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T.S. Eliot)
Back in September, I stumbled across an advertisement for the sale of a very special coffee joint – one that combines coffee and literature together into something out of a literature lover’s dream.
The building where the coffee shop resides was built in 1802 in the village of Thornton, West Yorkshire. This is the heart of what is affectionately known as Brontë Country. It was in the dining room of this now coffeehouse that the Brontë sisters Jane, Emily, and Anne, and their brother Branwell were born.
Pages from Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights cover a wall and one can sip tea while sitting in front of the fireplace which saw all four of their births. For those who love the Brontë sisters, this is wild.
The Brontë family lived at this home from 1815 to 1820. Several businesses have called this building home as well, including a butcher and a Brontë museum.
Recently the De Luca family purchased the building and converted it to a single-family home and an attached coffeehouse called Emily’s. And now, this building and business are for sale.
So, if you have £250,000 and some mad barista skills, you could be the proud owner of these lovely walls.
To learn more about Stacie of Forest City Stained Glass, read the interview here.
If you are curious to see the homes of other famous writers, check out this article from The Spaces.
on Etsy.
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