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Not Panicking, But Pannikin! Say It’s Not So!

The rumors are true. Pannikin downtown (675 G, 619-239-7891), the place where you can choose between a cup of fresh-roasted coffee and an African mask or a Tarahumara drum or a Mexican skeleton, is gonna close.

Today.

After 34 years.

“Well, we may have coffee and cakes for customers who come by over the weekend while we’re moving out,” says Verena Garnett.

She has run the place for years with her sister Vivienne. There are Pannikins up north, but this is the last to carry the collection of cultural curiosities from every continent, a kind of symbol of the big world out there that coffee opened up in the '80s.

Where you drink coffee

“The landlord wouldn't give us another lease,” says Verena. “We would have had to rent month by month, but we could see the writing on the wall.”

Besides, she says, downtown is changing. “It’s a young crowd. They’re not interested in cultural things. They’ll come in, take a picture of each other with an African mask, email it to their friends, and leave. Probably for Starbucks.”

But the eccentric sisters will be back. “We’ll go visit mum in England and then come back and find somewhere in Little Italy, North Park, University Heights, or even downtown.” But it won’t be Pannikin anymore. “We only had rights to that name on that site.”

Maybe they’ll name it “Caroline’s,” after Caroline, the three-wheel Indian Bajaj tuc-tuc/rickshaw they drive around town.

Caroline

What’ll I miss most? The smell of the coffee beans roasting as the sisters roasted them right outside on G street. It could drop a man at 20 paces.

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Yo-Yo Ma, Wagner, and Tchaikovsky come to San Diego

The rumors are true. Pannikin downtown (675 G, 619-239-7891), the place where you can choose between a cup of fresh-roasted coffee and an African mask or a Tarahumara drum or a Mexican skeleton, is gonna close.

Today.

After 34 years.

“Well, we may have coffee and cakes for customers who come by over the weekend while we’re moving out,” says Verena Garnett.

She has run the place for years with her sister Vivienne. There are Pannikins up north, but this is the last to carry the collection of cultural curiosities from every continent, a kind of symbol of the big world out there that coffee opened up in the '80s.

Where you drink coffee

“The landlord wouldn't give us another lease,” says Verena. “We would have had to rent month by month, but we could see the writing on the wall.”

Besides, she says, downtown is changing. “It’s a young crowd. They’re not interested in cultural things. They’ll come in, take a picture of each other with an African mask, email it to their friends, and leave. Probably for Starbucks.”

But the eccentric sisters will be back. “We’ll go visit mum in England and then come back and find somewhere in Little Italy, North Park, University Heights, or even downtown.” But it won’t be Pannikin anymore. “We only had rights to that name on that site.”

Maybe they’ll name it “Caroline’s,” after Caroline, the three-wheel Indian Bajaj tuc-tuc/rickshaw they drive around town.

Caroline

What’ll I miss most? The smell of the coffee beans roasting as the sisters roasted them right outside on G street. It could drop a man at 20 paces.

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4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
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