Telescope Coffee Is Taking Its Honeycomb Lattes and Fresh Pastries to a Bigger Space in SoMa

Telescope Coffee, known for its honeycomb lattes and decadent pastries, will upgrade into a larger space in SoMa later this spring. Jenny Ngo opened the tiny cafe in 2021 and says she will move into a yet-to-be-disclosed new space in early April. The final day of service at the micro cafe located at 451 9th Street will be March 18. Ngo says she has found a powerful community in the SoMa neighborhood and wants to better accommodate her fans with the bigger location. “The SoMa community has been wonderful,” Ngo says. “We want to stick around.”

Ngo, who grew up in San Francisco, is a member of what some call the fourth wave of coffee, which sees more owners who are people of color in specialty coffee, specifically the Vietnamese coffee scene. She partners with her childhood friend Jenny Huynh of Cosmic Dust, a San Jose-based coffee roaster specializing in Vietnamese coffees. Huynh roasts Telescope’s eponymous espresso blend using beans from Vietnam. Ngo only sells fair trade coffees at her shop; like Nob Hill and the Richmond’s Coffee Movement, even its house cup is an affordable, single-origin roast — in Ngo’s case, a Guatemalan.

The new location will allow for pop-ups to highlight other creators and small businesses, something about which Ngo is passionate. “Our space is so limited,” Ngo says of the current location. “So this next space will allow for more collaboration.” In the meantime, Ngo is selling the shop’s much-loved rose syrup in 12-ounce bottles for $18. There’ll be pastry specials on the way out, too. “It was always our goal to have a seating area,” Ngo says. “But this first location has been a great introduction to the community.”

Siddhi Balaji

Siddhi Balaji