Looking for the heart of Maple Leaf? It’s easy to argue that it’s to be found along the two blocks of Roosevelt Way Northeast that are bounded on the north by Maple Leaf Ace Hardware and to the south by Cloud City Coffee.
As AreaMan1 wrote in our Food & Drink section: “Cloud City is the wonderfully noisy nerve center of Maple Leaf. A true neighborhood coffee shop and meeting place.”
Since Cloud City opened eight years ago it’s been run by co-owners Jill Killen and Elthea Farr.
(Disclosure: One of the Maple Leaf Life editors was the third customer in the door when the coffee shop opened Sept. 1, 2002; the blog itself started at a Cloud City table.)
Now Farr is heading out, first to roam the northwest for much of the summer, then to live in Hawaii for a year with her husband, Devin McCarty, and their son, 2-year-old Xaven.
“I’m going to be watching my son grow up,” Farr said. “Frankly, this is the greatest gift somebody could ever give to me,” she says of Killen buying out her half of the store.
Killen said Cloud City will continue on as before, but with upgrades including a renewed bathroom, new tabletops, a recycling station for customers and a new paint job.
Farr will still work at the store off and on as needed through the summer. “Then we plan to spend six months on Maui and six months on the Big Island,” she said. “I have a blank slate – not that many people get to have this opportunity. It’s truly a blessing.”
Farr, 39, is renowned for her smile and her hat collection, often worn together on Saturdays. Customers have often wondered, “just how many does she own?”
She’s downsizing from around 75.
