If you visit Valparaiso you can not miss Playa Ancha. Enjoy its beautiful panoramic views and its exquisite cafes. Just today we bring you a very good tip to enjoy a tasty coffee accompanied by a delicious piece of homemade cake. The Waddington coffee shop is a new corner to enjoy looking at the bay of the port, located on the famous Gran Bretaña avenue.
To talk more about this beautiful area and its gastronomic offer, we contacted Claudia Machado, manager and owner of Café Waddington. Here we will learn about her reasons for setting up in the classic porteño hill.
-Why did you choose Playa Ancha to set up your coffee shop?
"It is a heritage hill, which has potential, where there is neighborhood life, where we know each other as neighbors. We are close to the waterfront, I always say, from every corner we have a view of the sea and I think that is an important value and we have tried, with our venture, to respect that dynamic and be a contribution to Playa Ancha.
-How did the "Waddington" coffee shop come about?
"The "Waddington" cafeteria arose as a response to the need imposed by tourists, since the coffee room is located next to the loft type lodging of the same name. It is a historic building dating from 1810, so the tourists we received asked us where they could have breakfast, and the truth is that in this sector of Playa Ancha, there was no place with these characteristics. In fact, it is a very beautiful neighborhood, a heritage site with a lot of history, but it had not been promoted in terms of services, and that is why the idea of the cafeteria came up".
-What characterizes the "Waddington" coffee shop?
"The cafeteria is an enterprise that works with products and people from the area, the logic has always been to work with people from the area, our suppliers are local, we have artisan pastries, but from people from here, from the hill, the workers of our team are from here, they are neighbors of the area, so that is also valued by the people of the neighborhood".
On the other hand, Claudia Machado points out that the pandemic played against them at the beginning, since the place was ready to open when the confinement began and after a year without being able to operate, they were able to inaugurate the cafe. At present the cafeteria and the "Waddington" loft are still open, under strict Covid protocols and have the seal of tourist confidence given by Sernatur.
-And how was the reception?
"The truth is that the response was much more positive than we expected, the public that arrived was perhaps not the one that was initially planned, since we were aiming more at loft customers or tourists in general, but the public that arrived were mainly the neighbors, but the truth is that the fact that people really wanted to go out had a lot of influence, Many people had been locked up at home for more than a year without being able to meet with family and friends, and I think that influenced the positive response from the public, so the demand has been much higher than we expected, for the context in which we actually opened".