Motoring Coffee — Restaurant in San Francisco

Coffee shop? Coworking space? Car club? It's hard to tell what this space is trying to be.

I went there on a weekday morning to grab coffee, so there was no line. As other reviews have mentioned, there are cars taking up about 50% of the space. I’ll admit, it’s a cool and fun vibe. Sadly, the coffee and pastry quality is mid at best. I got a 12oz drip, and my partner got a cappuccino. The baristas know what they're doing and are nice, but the beans themselves are sub-par. I bought a bag of the "Garage Queen" (unclear if it was the single origin or a blend) and had never seen so many quakers (underdeveloped beans that taste bad) before. So if you're looking for your next go-to specialty coffee shop in the neighborhood, this ain't it. There are many other higher-quality options in the neighborhood close by already.

The other confounding half of their business is in the back behind glass doors, where there is a beautifully decorated space with meeting rooms (and more cars). I had to do some post-visit investigation to fully understand, but it seems they offer some sort of car-enthusiast’s members club that offers coworking space, events, and luxury car rentals? As someone who hasn’t owned a car in my 13 years in this very car-adverse city, I was deeply confused as to why this exists, and if there is even a market of people who would be interested in this. The only part that made sense was the work and event space. With the exception of Neon down the street, the Marina/Cow Hollow neighborhood lacks places to work for folks who don't want to venture downtown. An interesting thing to note, however, is you can just walk in and work here without a paying a membership fee. I noticed the coworking space behind the glassdoors was completely empty, while the coffee shop space was packed to the brim with folks on their laptops.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens...

If you’re looking for a cool new cafe with that LA vibe, this is the spot. I’d rate them 4/5 stars because they burnt my chocolate croissant, but otherwise, I enjoyed this new location. They’re a social club and cafe based in LA (founded 2019) that just soft opened at Union St & Van Ness last Friday.

My friend Danica wrote a really nice article about them, so I had to come see for myself. There was already a line out the door when I came at 9:30am on Monday (soft opening hours are everyday 8am-2pm). They had a few pastries left, so I ordered a chocolate croissant (heated up) along with a matcha latte. The wait time wasn’t bad; about 15 minutes and it took like 5 minutes for a table to open up.

I just did some work from home here and it’s such a bright, airy spot with WiFi. The matcha latte was good and came with a cute latte heart. I peeked into their social club space, which houses two cars behind a giant glass door along with lounges. On their website it says “SF Membership rates will run $150/month (after $500 Initiation)”, so if you’re looking for a hot new social club in Cow Hollow for coworking, events, and other perks for car enthusiasts, it seems worth to check out.

All in all, I’d...

Looks good ln paper but the execution of it does not work out.

Parking: none. Your gonna have to park a few blocks down if you’re lucky, other than that have someone Order your drinks and you drive around until you find a place to park…6 blocks away.

Drinks: cashier at front looked uninterested and looked very tired, it was only 10:00 in the morning 😭 did you sleep girl? Drink options are typical coffee shop items + matcha lattes cause ya know they gotta get on the trend. (btw it was horrible do not get yo matcha here. Japan town has better options) They don’t charge for other milk options which I guess is ok for you lactose intolerance transplants. coffee was watered down as well.

Atmosphere: it was paaaacked, like no where to sit and on a Friday? Don’t you people work? The space is divided between a glass wall where I guess you need to pay a $200 a month membership to get space next to cars they have on display( don’t get me wrong I’m a car girl but COME ON? Yall are lame for not getting other people a chance to see the cars) again lameeee.

Conclusion: it’s just another transplant tourist trap. There are waaay better coffee shops( and car meets) in the city...