Coffee. Community. Connection. That is the motto that our clients and owners of the South LA Cafe live by as they run a cafe and marketplace that is on a mission to fight racial, social, economic, and food inequity by serving as a nutritional refuge within a food desert. Their business provides healthy and affordable food and beverage options to the surrounding Leimert Park area, as well as serving as a community organizing and empowerment space. This tenant improvement of a former church assembly space was converted into the South LA Cafe and Market. We created an aesthetic that is simple, modern, and rustic to complement the appreciation of organic products and the practical needs of the space. During the height of the pandemic South LA Cafe kept their promise to the community by creating a grocery bag program, and office42 architecture volunteered as support.