CRESTVIEW — Fans of Casbah Coffee Co.’s cinnamon roll bread pudding and freshly roasted brews needn't fear if they soon find the downtown café shuttered.
The business — which has outgrown its 106 Main St. location in the former New Central Café building — is moving to new, bigger digs up the street, owners said.
Bill and Tracy Toannon are renovating the approximately 3,000-square-foot, former Harvest Vineyard women’s residence — on the corner of West Pine Avenue and Wilson Street, less than a block off Main Street — to meet their needs.
“It will be about twice the size we are now,” Tracy Toannon said.
The couple are among Crestview's first business owners to use the downtown area's new mixed-use zoning. It will allow them to have a residential component above the coffee house.
The Toannons are renovating the second floor to offer a seven-room student dormitory that will include shared bathrooms and a common study and living room.
“It’s a place where they can study and relax,” Tracy Toannon said.
Furnished rooms will be marketed toward students at Florida A&M University's pharmacy school in the nearby Alatex building, and students participating in Florida International University's new physician assistant program, which is expected to see its first students arrive in Crestview in a year or two, organizers have said.
It won’t be all work and no play for the students.
“We’ve got the Kickback at the Casbah on the first and third Friday of the month,” Tracy Toannon said, referring to the café’s open mic and karaoke nights.
She hopes to see the entertainment component grow, but she and her husband plan to take things slowly and see what works.
And, Toannon said, while the coffee shop’s patrons’ favorite menu selections will make the move up Main Street, “there will be some new things on menu, but we’re still putting it together.”
Email News Bulletin Staff Writer Brian Hughes, follow him on Twitter or call 850-682-6524.
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Main Street Crestview coffee shop to move north and expand