Coffee Shop Approved For Historic Building
From sermons to sinkers to espresso shots, the historic brick building at Sunbury and Central College is headed for a new life as a coffee shop after winning Westerville Planning Commission approval Wednesday night.
The long-vacant 1868 structure has been a Baptist church, a one-room schoolhouse, a private residence, and Harry & Dot’s Bait Store; now it’s on track to become a neighborhood café called Canoe Beans.
For years, the small brick building watched traffic stream past the busy intersection, its white front porch peeling and its windows dark, even as new subdivisions and shops filled in around it. Aunda and Drew Klopfer drove by, too, wondering what might come next.
The building came on the market, and Drew said he realized how many times he’d thought about it. “I grew up wondering what’s inside that building,” he said, explaining that he and his mother had wanted for some time to go into business together.
The mother-and-son team first floated the idea of turning the old structure into a coffee shop during a Planning Commission work session last October. Their vision for Canoe Beans, a small, locally owned shop, centers on preserving the brick building's familiar outline while opening it up as a neighborhood gathering place.
At Wednesday’s meeting, city staff outlined how the plan would reuse the existing 1,344-square-foot building for a coffee shop with indoor and outdoor seating, a mezzanine tucked under the old roofline, new landscaping, and a glassy north-side addition that pulls light into the space.
Architect Joaquin Serantes said the design team tried to let the building’s history show through even as they updated it for modern use. The goal, he told commissioners, was not to erase the past but to keep the historic elements legible alongside the newer materials and big windows.
Commissioners responded warmly, praising both the proposed use and the effort to preserve one of the city’s older buildings. Several noted how the design had evolved since the project’s concept review last fall, especially around the entrance and corner treatment.
Even the less glamorous details got attention. Staff recommended rollout trash containers because the lot is too tight for a trash truck to maneuver, and asked that lighting be dialed down near neighboring homes. Landscaping and buffering on the north and east sides will need to meet additional conditions as the project moves forward.
In the end, commissioners called the proposal a good fit for the corner and a welcome investment in a property that has sat empty for years. With a 7–0 vote, the Klopfers can now move into final design and permitting, aiming to turn the worn brick landmark at Sunbury and Central College into a place where neighbors linger over coffee rather than just drive by.
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