Elisha Nunez
A mysterious being greets you at the entrance to this gathering place. With wings surrounding an eye in the center, this guardian – a seraph – welcomes you as you walk inside one of El Paso’s latest coffee shops.
Located on the corner of Trawood Dr. and Mosswood St. is Synaxis Coffee, an up-and-coming
coffee shop that opened its doors in December of 2023. Upon walking through the chain-link
gate and fence with our celestial friend, a spacious outside seating area leads inside the shop.
As you walk into the cafe, you are welcomed by a black-and-white color scheme that decorates
the interior accompanied by the scent of freshly brewed coffee. Customers are also met by a
diverse menu that offers specialty coffee served in specialty drinks.
In a specialty coffee shop, customers are served high-grade coffee. Like wine, coffee is graded on a 100-point scale, with anything scoring 80 or above-considered specialty coffee. From local favorites like a Café de Olla to exotic drinks like a Brazilian Lemonade (served with a shot of espresso or matcha), customers can test specialty coffee and more in foreign or familiar ways.
While a coffee shop, Synaxis Coffee offers more than just your favorite drinks.
The word “synaxis” is a Greek word meaning “gathering” or “assembly” and ties into the cafe’s main mission: fostering a sense of community through coffee.
Jorge Najera, the local 26-year-old responsible for owning and operating Synaxis Coffee told
The City Magazine more about his desire to bring locals closer together.
“Coffee is a social drink. It’s meant to be enjoyed with other people,” Najera said.
“There’s a lot of division in the world. I don’t think there’s a need for more, so I think a coffee shop is a good addition to that.”
Najera’s experience with coffee runs back almost a decade.
He got his first taste of coffee-making in Minnesota as a college student. From there, he went on to different locations like San Antonio before settling back down in El Paso. Having worked with different cafes and coffee roasters, Najera said it felt right to open up his own back in his hometown.
For months, Najera searched for a way to bring Synaxis Coffee into motion. Hopping onto sites
like Facebook Marketplace, he wanted to start small, and buy a cart to do some pop-ups at local
businesses.
Instead, he found what would turn out to be Synaxis Coffee’s future space.
Najera did his best to renovate and decorate the space to make it the gathering place he envisioned it to be over the course of five to six months. It would not be until December, the day before Christmas Eve, that he would finally open its doors and bring Synaxis Coffee to life.
“I’m trying to do something different for the city. I had a really good friend who helped with setting up the shop. Even now, there’s a lot of support, and not just friends but family and customers that have become friends,” Najera said. “There’s a lot of other stuff we want to do. We’re very adamant about coffee education, spreading it to the community. When you come to the shop, you’re learning about coffee and you leave with something new and different.”
Now that his vision has been realized, Najera has brainstormed different ways to share his love
for coffee and coffee-making with the community. That said, Najera has worked on collaborations with local shops, hosting workshops, coffee parties, and more.
Through these activities, Najera wants to send people home with knowledge about the different
aspects of coffee. From developing their palate to different types of coffee to knowing how to
brew and make their cup, Najera does not shy away from sharing helpful tips and tricks with
others.
“This can be the place where you can come and ask the questions and we’ll help you out. We just want to see people enjoy good coffee [and] make it themselves,” Najera said.
Not only does Najera want to work with coffee enjoyers in the community, but also coffee
Industry experts. From roasters and baristas to other business owners in the Borderland, Najera hopes to work with those in the same field to continue his passion for sharing and creating ideas.
“We’ve collaborated [with] Vyable Coffee [when] it was opened as a coffee shop on Texas
Street. We did what’s called the bar takeover. We actually went over there, took some of our ingredients, a section of our menu and we served over there,” Najera said.
“It’s mutual friendships with other businesses and business owners – not just here, even cafes in Juarez. We got to meet some of the owners over there and they visited us.”
Whether it is teaching or learning, Najera welcomes the idea of sharing the love for coffee
throughout his community. As his business grows, Najera dreams of adding more staff and even
branching out to a new location.
In the meantime, Najera wants to continue adding to his community-building activities by hosting
more or collaborating with different shops or roasters.
