Cozy cafes/bookstores/outdoor atmosphere for writing in a different environment outside your home?

I am all for the cozy atmosphere and aesthetic of coffee shops/bookstores/libraries/etc for writing outside your home. The craziest/saddest thing is that I live in an area where getting to places like that requires driving.

I can walk to some of them, but it is a bit of a walk to and back and THANK GOD THERE ARE NO HILLS NEAR ME! The “cozy” cafe is a Dunkin Donuts which ain’t cozy and aesthetic. It’s more like a “get your coffee or tea, chat for a bit, and then get the fuck out” kinda atmosphere to me personally!

Far as a bookstore, Barnes &Noble is a drive to get there and it always seems to be crowded.

There is another library, yet that requires driving to. The “closest” library is in somewhat of a walking distance. I don’t go there as I used to because I have to walk and lug around a heavy backpack.

I can’t ask for someone to take me there on the days I want to go nor can I take the bus or an Uber.

So, what I am trying I to get at is that going to cozy places to write in a different environment is a bit of a challenge for me! Maybe it might be a bit different for you. As a matter of fact, what about you?

Is there a place in your town where you can write without being inside your home? What’s the atmosphere like? Is it cozy and has an overall great vibe?

Lend me your thoughts!

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Realizing that without a car and even cash, I am practically stuck in a giant rut or something.

Such as life…

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I just moved a few months ago and I basically don’t have a place. Well, I say that but when I get my drivers license there’s a lot of places I can go as long as it’s spring or summer. Aka basically places in the woods.

I honestly wish my library near me was bigger. Because it’s so small that it gives off grab what you want and leave vibes. My old library was so big that I used to feel so comfortable literally sitting down and reading in one of the aisles.

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That sucks! :confused:

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https://m.youtube.com/results?search_query=teravibe+youtube

You may want this

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Instead of going into a cozy environment outside, you can go to a cozy environment indoors?

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Y E S

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It’s interesting.
I’ll try it out. Does it play good music that matches the video? Like if it’s a magical forest, the music is nature and mystical related?

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Anyone else?

That’s pretty much any place I live in. :upside_down_face: Even when I visit somewhere, you have to drive. If I visited or lived in another country where you don’t have to drive (whether it’s easy to walk or it’s filled with great public transportation), it’d be a culture shock because I feel like no such place exists lol.

Barnes and Noble is always crowded—actually a lot of bookstores seem to be crowded anyway lol. And yeah, I feel that. The nearest bookstore from me (which also happens to be B&N) is three hours away… :confused:

I feel that. Before I could drive, I wasn’t able to go anywhere to write unless someone took me… and back then, we either had no car or one car (for which my mom always used). So, I was typically stuck writing at home. Then my sister moved back in and there were times when we went places, but it wasn’t often (specifically going somewhere to write). It wasn’t until I got my driver’s license and I was able to use my parent’s car (back in 2021…ish) where I could do such a thing. Though I don’t drive much anyway so where I go is limited. :rofl:

The main place I go to is our local coffeeshop, Red Beard. It apparently used to be a music store before 2017, but I guess it went out of business or something and the guy that owns it now took over and made it into a cafe. It’s a very popular cafe, too, because it’s the only main one in town. I mean, we do have Scooters (both a drive thru and actual cafe) and we finally got a Starbucks last year, but they cannot compare to Red Beard—mostly because they tend to make my drinks watery, and I’d gave Starbees the pass at first because they’re new, but now not too sure. I only go to Starbucks here (the one an hour away which we used to go to whenever we went to Target was really good) if Red Beard is too busy. And Scooters also makes my drink watery, or sometimes taste funny. Red Beard always makes my Chai perfect. c:

But anyway…

Red Beard is this small coffeeshop in our downtown area, and what I mean by small is that there’s roughly six or so tables in there, and they can fill up fast. The atmosphere definitely gives you homey vibes, and the people that work there are great! A lot of people that go are actually friends of the owner who works there occasionally as a barista himself. And not only is he such a nice guy, he does a lot for the community (both being great and doing great marketing lol). Every December, he has carriage rides that go around our mainstreet with hot cocoa; Meet and Greet with Santa, and a bunch of other stuff. For New Years, he did giveaways and a contest (soups, deserts, etc.) where winners took home random gifts like RB merch and cooking utensils, etc. along with free coffees and whatnot. My sister won a “free coffee for a year” where she could order anything on their menu… for free… for a year. It’s so cool!

image

I absolutely love going whenever I can, especially sitting by the windows because it just makes it feel magical… kind of weird to say, but it really does. Mostly during great weather (snowing or raining) lol.

Otherwise, the only other place I’ve written outside of home is at the library (AKA work) and I’ve only ever does this once because my go-to is Red Beard. :rofl: And I only came here to write because Red Beard was too busy to sit down at.

But there’s a desk in a corner upstairs where the YA section is and I chose that spot because it’s not only far away from the circulation desk, but it’s surrounded by books—particularly ones with the target audience I write, so it gives me some inspiration. I can’t find a picture online, so I’ll post one later (that I have in my phone).

Otherwise, whenever I visit Columbus, Ohio (where my sister lives), all I really wanna do is visit all their bookstores and libraries and cafes and write. :sweat_smile: There’s this beautiful cafe in Westerville called Java Central Cafe and Roaster:

And then there’s the Book Loft in German Village:

SO GORGEOUS!

We’re hoping to move to Columbus sometime this year or next year. My sister has her heart set on moving toward the end of summer, but I know it probably won’t happen until next year.

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All of the cafes near me you have to drive to as well. It’s really sad how awful the transportation system is in the US, when so many places in the world have it all figured out already :confused:

There’s a really cozy tea shop about 10 minutes drive from my house, and 5 minutes of walking (the parking is a little ways away). It’s a chain called Dobra Tea. They have these little nooks with pillows and carpet to sit on, and a small tea table. So it’s super nice to just lounge on your laptop while drinking really delicious teas (and their desserts are delicious and homemade based on location). I spend perhaps a little too much money there :sweat_smile:

Here’s a photo - I couldn’t find one from my location, which has darker walls and romantic lighting, but this is pretty much the same set up:

The other place I go to is a smoothie shop on my college campus. I walk to it in between classes and sit there. They have these little meeting-esque rooms with closing doors in them that I like to meet one of my friends at and sit and write or do homework. They’re private and they have really good smoothies and london fogs there. If I had to choose between the two, though, I’d 100% choose Dobra Tea.

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Yeah, what is up with that? Like America get your shit together or something!

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Kinda want to go the closest library to me, but it’s a nineteen minute walk and I have to lug around a heavy ass bag on my back.

I don’t drive nor do have I have someone to take me and I lack money to take the bus there.

Seriously, why couldn’t the walk to the library be like five minutes or less?!

Don’t get me started on the other library I’ve went to which is larger but farther away that I would have to drive there.

This sucks so much! :angry:

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Found the pictures! Though, it’s technically a video so I took screenshots… which is why they’re blurry lol.


Saaaame.

Like, a constant battle I’ve seen over social media is how people in other countries (not from the US) are like, “Why can’t you just walk? Why does everyone have to have a car?” Like… do you not understand the concept of distance? Most places in the US, you can’t walk to. Like, maybe in NYC where you can walk to the subway or there’s everything downtown if you live downtown. But in most normal places, you can’t easily walk there. Heck, I’ve lived in places where the closest grocery store was fifteen minutes away… by car. Do you really think I’m gonna walk an hour or two away to get a week’s worth of groceries and then carry them all back? Hell no. You’d be crazy to do that.

This is why I’d like to invest in a nice bike so it’s a lot easier to get around. But even then, it’s a lot of exercise still (especially for the damn hills) and not every place is bike/walk friendly. :confused:

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We have a sister café next to our bookstore. It’s quite small but filled with all sorts of creatives at any given time of the day. The vibes are very cool, the design is very minimalist. The café hosts art installations at the start of very month. That’s my go-to place to workshop ideas. There’s more talking than writing though.

I get almost all of my writing done in the library. It’s by no means cosy, but it works.

I tried writing at a church, it was an experience. The stained glass and the vaulted ceilings were atmospheric. It was a bit much though, and the ventilation wasn’t great. I like the church gardens. I go there all the time to read. Maybe I could try writing there. I’m actually going on a writing retreat to a monastery in spring, that’ll be fun.

My absolute favourite place though, is the café at the Bloomsbury Waterstones. I used to go there almost every day, sit by the window with my books, laptop, coffee and a bagel and write away. I met my weirdo writing friends there.

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Lucky…
:grin:

This is really sad to me, I am the opposite in the sense that I can’t imagine living somewhere that I’d have to drive everywhere! My local library is 2 minutes from my house, and the next closest is 20 minutes away.

I actually work in the library service, so I don’t really like to go there to write on my days off because my colleagues always distract me/ end up chatting to me. But the few times that I have, it is cozy and relaxing… though a lot of the time I get people who come up to me and ask me for things, and I feel like I can’t not help because I know the answer lol.

I don’t have any bookstore kind of places close to me, the closest one I would have to take a bus. I’ve never actually been in there, but it looks really cosy. The few times I’ve gone writing in a coffee shop (usually Costa or Cafe Nero) it’s very cozy and its nice to sit and have a coffee/breakfast while I write but with the cost of living crisis at the moment, it’s way too expensive… so writing at home it is.

I actually think Writing in different rooms in my house changes my vibe. I’m far more productive in my bedroom than my living room, or if I sit at my dining table I can focus and hit a higher word count.

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It’s so crazy to me that there are places where you can just walk and it’s easy to get to, and I’ve lived in places where you could essentially walk but it’s not always practical unless you have great transportation. I used to live in Breckenridge and Keystone, Colorado and they’re very tiny towns with not much but they’re surrounded by other tiny towns and some, like Silverthorne and Frisco have shopping centers (very small ones, to say the least) that you can walk to but you have to use the bus. When I lived there at the end of 2016 and early 2017, we didn’t have a car to easily drive everywhere (drove by RV, but it was only used in necessary times). So, I would occasionally use the bus to go to the store. The buses there are amazing—they’re free and they have a map of where they actually go at most bus stops. And their bus stops are within walking distance to specific places, just a bit of a hard walk sometimes. Like when I went to see Moana in theaters, the movie theater is on this massive hill so there’s a lot of stairs, and then you also have to cross over the grocery store’s parking lot because it’s on the far side of it. But like, most of the small towns like Keystone don’t have grocery stores or gas stations or anything of that sort. They do have a convenience store with minor groceries but they were expensive as all hell. I’m talking 6+ dollars for a half gallon of milk. We only went as a last resort, and it was right across the street from where we lived. Otherwise, it’s a good 20-30 minute drive on the freeway to the actual grocery store. :upside_down_face: And in winter? You’d be mad crazy going because the winters up there are rough. When we lived there, it was roughly 4-5 feet of snow and very icy, cold, and slushy. :rofl:

Awh, I’m sorry. :confused:

Yeah, that is rough. I went in the early morning when we had first opened because it’s a less busier time then, and chose a space in the far, far corner where you can’t even be seen… unless you walk over there lol It’s hidden behind a bunch of bookshelves.

But if that happened to me, I’d just put headphones on and ignore people. :rofl:

Oof, definitely. I only go when I have the money for it or when it’s my “fun paycheck” week where I don’t have to spend a lot of money on extra bills. :sweat_smile: I’ve limited it to about once a week or once every two weeks, depending. I will admit, I have gone twice in the same week, but some of those times, I didn’t buy it. Someone else did lol.

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Yes, I really like writing in some places in my city, Calgary. Winter cold and wind are brutal here, so on my lunch breaks I often go to a large indoor garden downtown (when I am at work), called Devonian Gardens. It has carps in ponds and lots of greenery. I also don’t mind my neighborhood library that wrote about in one of my stories, inside a large rec-center complex (Vivo Place). It is now under renos, and one of the additions will be a large indoor garden with artificial lawn which I expect to become another ‘writing’ place I love in my city. I also do a lot of my thinking in the gym, sauna and pool at the same rec facility. At home, when I write, I often put Haldon ‘Music for Writing’ YouTube on TV to have library and classical music atmosphere.

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