Portland’s Coffee By Design the latest to get national mention, named one of America’s 10 best

Zagat.com, an international restaurant review website, came out recently with its list of the 10 “coolest independent coffee shops in the U.S.,” and snuggled in a roster of shops from Brooklyn, Seattle, Denver and Chicago (among other places), is the Portland-based Coffee By Design.

www.coffeebydesign.com

Here’s what Zagat’s Linnea Covington wrote about CBD, which is the first shop on her list, although it’s in no particular order:

Sixteen years ago Mary Allen Lindemann and Alan Spear opened this tiny coffee shop in Portland, Maine with the idea of building a place for the community. Over the years, the shop has grown from their original Congress Street location to three other shops and a micro roaster where they process all their beans. But despite their mini-expansion, the independent store remains homey and popular for Mainers as they continue to serve the community one cup of Fore Street coffee at a time.

It’s not the first positive mention on a national level tied to Maine’s largest city in recent months. Earlier this fall, Outside Magazine called Portland one of the country’s best places to live (“One of the only places on earth where you can ski at 8 a.m., surf at 1 p.m., and eat a five-star dinner at 7 p.m.,” lauded one magazine voter), and editors at the video game publication Game Informer urged readers to pick up Portland author Alex Irvine’s books about Transformers to learn more about the characters’ backgrounds.

The Portland farmers' market. (BDN photo by Seth Koenig)

Liz Neumark, CEO of the top New York City event planning and catering company Great Performances, wrote about her trip up the coast to Portland and its farmers’ market (itself named last year as one of America’s best by Travel + Leisure Magazine, while we’re on the topic of national recognition) in a story published by The Huffington Post this week.

Just up the road a tick, Lewiston brewer Luke Livingston got his due as one of Forbes Magazine’s “30 under 30” list of young entrepreneurs.

Seth Koenig

About Seth Koenig

Seth has nearly a decade of professional journalism experience and writes about the greater Portland region.