Oak Park residents and visitors to downtown Oak Park will soon be sipping “the highest quality Arabica coffees” from Cafe Descartes, which is expected to open in the next couple of months at 1018 Lake St.
Cafe Descartes founder Sony Javid said it would be his sixth coffee shop in the Chicago area. He noted that his shop on the campus of the University of Illinois provided the inspiration for the new roughly 900-square-foot Oak Park shop.
“I have a lot of customers at UIC,” he said, noting that many of the students who frequent the shop there have asked for one in Oak Park.
Javid said he opened Cafe Descartes in 1992 and has expanded throughout the city. He said he recently sold one of the Rogers Park locations, where he currently lives. Javid said he also intends to move to Oak Park within the next two or three years.
Cafe Descartes will be located one shop down from the Lake Theater, adjacent to Fannie May Chocolates. In a previous incarnation, the space was once a Starbucks.
Javid said he is working on the build out of the store right now and aims to be open in the next two months.
Javid is an entrepreneur and author, who published the 2012 autobiography “Immigrant entrepreneur: Winning Against the Odds,” which chronicles his childhood in Pakistan and immigration to the United States in 1979.
“(Sony’s) inspirational autobiography is filled with advice about how to start a business, from the initial vision to planning a marketing plan, from finding good employees to negotiating with banks,” according to Javid’s LinkedIn profile.
He further notes that he was inspired by coming to the U.S. and seeing other immigrants like himself working hard in their struggle for prosperity.
“The United States, without a doubt, is a testament to the idea that personal freedom can lead to civic responsibility,” he notes. “Motivated by the endless possibilities this country seemed to offer, I strove to better myself and contribute to the community as a responsible, conscientious adult.”
CONTACT: tim@oakpark.com