Indian Coffee House of College Street, home to countless addas, is set to expand its footprint on July 6.
The heritage café will launch a new outlet in Diamond Harbour. This will be the third time the Indian Coffee House is branching out, after outlets in Jadavpur and Serampore.
The College Street address has been a meeting place for Bengal’s who’s who, including Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Mrinal Sen, Soumitra Chatterjee, Sunil Ganguly, Shakti Chattopadhyay, Amartya Sen and many others.
The Coffee House, which transformed from the erstwhile Albert Hall to its present avatar in 1942, had played a key role in the promotion of arts and literature.
The Diamond Harbour outlet of the Indian Coffee House will be spread over 3,500 sqft at the multi-storey CK Centre, adjacent to NH17 near the town police station.
Author Amar Mitra, filmmaker Sudeshna Roy, Ananya Chakraborty and other local personalities are slated to attend the launch.
Sources said the signature flavour of coffee and snacks available at the Calcutta-based heritage café will be found at the new outlet too.
The Coffee House Cooperative, run by the staff of the original outlet, is behind the initiative.
“People in Diamond Harbour and tourists who visit this harbour town mostly as a weekend destination can rediscover this iconic brand in a new ambience,” said a source in operations.
“Diamond Harbour has a legacy of art and culture. We will regularly invite poets, writers and intellectuals here for sessions to create the ambience of the original outlet,” said Prasun Bhowmik, poet-activist and honorary adviser to the Coffee House Cooperative Society.
“I am hopeful the new café will boost coffee-culture tourism and attract local people, too,” added Bhowmik.
Jhareswar Chattopadhyay, an eminent author from Diamond Harbour who has been invited to the July 6 launch, recalled his “glorious” days in the 1970s at the College Street Coffee House.
“I think young authors of Diamond Harbour would love the CoffeeHouse here just the same, 50 years later,” he said.
