Over the summer, it felt like I was constantly seeing Instagram stories posted by friends who were visiting London, in which they modelled pale green coffee cups and vibrant iced matcha lattes. ‘It’s not a London trip anymore without Blank Street’, one caption read. Of the endless coffee available in London, I wondered what it was about this ‘Blank Street’ brand that made it such a necessity for a day out in London. Having not thought much more of it, I was only reminded of Blank Street when I recently encountered a large crowd of people gathered outside the Bullring. They were forming an orderly queue to enter what appeared to be a very small cafe next to Wingstop, decorated in the same shades of pale green I had seen on Instagram.

This was the brand-new Birmingham location of Blank Street Coffee, an international chain which began as a coffee truck in New York in 2020 and has since stormed the UK. Following the rave reviews I had seen from friends, I knew I wanted to visit, but I decided to wait a couple of weeks for the hordes of people outside to die down. When I did finally visit on a Saturday morning, we arrived during a rare lull in the queue and so we only had to wait about ten minutes. The cafe was small with very limited seating, but most people appeared to order their drinks and take them away. There were a lot of staff working behind the counter and so they weren’t rushed, they were able to take care with preparing everyone’s orders. We were quite taken aback by the affordable prices, for a large coffee chain: the drinks were priced in the ballpark of £3, in a world where even Costa’s drinks are sliding towards £5 each.

We were able to sit at a small two-seater table outside, in the crisp autumn sun. Despite the cold, I knew I needed to try the iced matcha latte which Blank Street Coffee is famed for: I went with the blueberry matcha and was slightly mesmerised by its blend of matcha green and creamy lilac colour. I almost didn’t want to drink it as it looked so dainty, and of course, I had to take a picture. The muted shades of green and pink of Blank Street Coffee’s branding are also visible in its drinks; their unfussy minimalism is seriously appealing to the eye. The first sip was pure blueberry, and as the drink mixed together, the matcha started to creep in. It was deliciously sweet, but the fruit flavour was authentic. The silky, refreshing drink was accompanied by our shared pistachio cookie, filled with gooey cream.

Shortly after we were served, the queue built up again and the wait time became much longer, so we were lucky in that regard. I’m already planning to return in order to sample the white chocolate matcha, and the banana bread matcha sounds intriguing too. With Blank Street Coffee’s seemingly overnight ascent to international acclaim, it’s been heralded as a potential competitor for Starbucks – in my opinion, it’s definitely worth waiting for.

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