![]() Onyx tops almost everyone’s list for NWA, partly because it’s an early exemplar in this region, pushing for fare trade and education. Onyx serves its beans at three area “labs,” in addition to selling wholesale beyond. The original Onyx Coffee Lab, along with its roastery, is in Springdale. ![]() At Church & Center, where we had breakfast on the small, covered patio that Arsaga’s shares with a breathtakingly hipster mobile phone accessory store (at least that’s what it appeared to be), the menu featured toast with different toppings, like almond butter and bananas, or pears and goat cheese, or avocado mash. Arsaga’s at The Depot, for example, serves sandwiches, crêpes, and wine. ![]() The other two locations offer surprisingly robust menus they’re cafés curiously akin to Australian coffee shops. And NWA lights up rather intensely on the scale.Īrsaga’s sells and serves its coffee at four locations in Fayetteville. Indeed, there is, perhaps, no better litmus right now of cultural relevancy than coffee. Hopefully you can see past it to the takeaway: trickle-down trends have reached NWA. And, clearly, I’m also being unnecessarily sarcastic here. So, admittedly, I am woefully out of touch with the rising generation. On that Friday afternoon, I relished observing their inter-tribal communication, which seemed to be conducted mostly through translation apps like Instagram and Snapchat, their electronic missives (astonishingly) replacing language entirely, and, indeed, even functioning as proxy mating calls.Ĭlearly, it’s been a while since I’ve been on a college campus, or had close and regular contact with college students. And in one corner, there was a pretty pack of metrosexual hipsters doting on themselves immaculate, curated, glowing. There were the bearded and tattooed kind – some of the man-bun variety, and some of the closely related lumberjack family – as well as quite a few from the clean-cut, Christian clan (the two girls next to me were having Bible study). In fact, until a cadre of frat boys showed up – all in t-shirts and flip-flops, a uniform that has not only proven to be universal among this species, but timeless as well – the scene was dominated by hipsters. Serving both coffee and beer, it attracts a pan-Millennial audience. Take, for example, Puritan Coffee Bar, located on Dickson Street, the town’s main drag. Here, you’ll find all the creature comforts of hipster life: maker goods, third wave coffee, microbrew, yoga studios, and, with a little foraging, even local, gluten-free, carb-free, sugar-free, and fat-free flora. Fayetteville, especially, is a hipster sanctuary, where one can observe this finely groomed species flourishing with remarkable density in its new-found habitat. With a high proportion of college students, and a rise in new wealth, the area has created an unexpectedly vibrant oasis for Millennial culture amidst the otherwise quiet and pastoral Ozarks. I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. Over the past couple of years, during their trips up to Kansas City, they convinced me to make the three-and-a-half-hour drive – a straight shot south on Highway 71 – to visit them. They moved there nearly two years ago so that Andy could take up a teaching position at the University of Arkansas, located in Fayetteville. My friends Andy and Kimly have contributed to NWA’s recent growth. Restaurants, bars, cafés, hotels, and museums have sprung up within the last half decade, making the once-sleepy town not only the attractive and sensible place locals have always wanted to live, but a shiny new destination for long weekenders as well. No longer in a dry county, Bentonville witnessed a boom in new businesses, especially in the hospitality industry. Able to issue liquor licenses, these towns offered more “amenities.” But, in 2012, after significant lobbying, the alcohol ban was finally lifted. ![]() These companies have attracted workers from all over the quad-state region and beyond, doubling the NWA population between 19.ĭue to a ban on the sale of alcohol, many who worked in Benton County (Wal-Mart is headquartered in Bentonville, which is located in Benton County) chose to live outside the county and commute from nearby towns like Springdale, or Fayetteville, which is about 30 minutes south. Hunt (a trucking company), and, most notably, the Wal-Mart empire – NWA (the local shorthand for Northwest Arkansas) is the fastest growing area of that state. ![]() Home to three Fortune 500 companies – Tyson Foods, J.B. In the decades since I last visited my neighboring state to the south, I have heard increasing praise for Arkansas’s upper-left corner. ![]()
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