The Memphis-based coffee shop, Vice and Virtue, will be one of three local concession vendors to join the newly renovated Tom Lee Park opening this Labor Day Weekend, co-owner Teri Perkins confirms.
All vendors will serve its products at walk-up counters, so that residents can enjoy the 300,000-square-foot park grounds overlooking the Mississippi River.
As such, Vice and Virtue’s menu will primarily include specialty coffees made with its in-house blends and pastries, as well as a few wines and batch cocktails, Perkins says. This will be the coffee shop’s second location with its flagship store housed inside the Arrive Hotel on 477 South Main Street, where it partners with the Memphis-based pastry cafe, Hustle and Dough. The coffee shop is currently in discussion with Hustle and Dough to offer their pastries at the park, but the deal is not finalized, she says.
The hope is for customers to be able to easily pick up food and beverages to savor while strolling the new park grounds, whether watching their kids at the playground or soaking up the sensational waterfront sunsets.
“The focus is really going to be that everything is walkable,” she says. “You can enjoy [the food and beverages] while enjoying the park.”
The park will host a new monument by American-artist Theaster Gates, an outdoor classroom with river-centered curriculum, a playground, and a sunset canopy dedicated in memory to Tyre Nicols, a 29-year-old black Memphian resident who was assaulted and killed by the Memphis police in January. It will also have 1,000 trees, as well as native grasses and shrubs, according to the park’s website.
The park is named after Tom Lee who single-handedly saved 32 people from a steamship disaster on the Mississippi River in May 1925.
“Tom Lee Park honors a man who saw humanity and became a superhero,” the park says on its website. “The park inspires all to act with the courage, humanity and compassion embodied by Tom Lee.”
Formerly a downtown resident with her husband and store co-owner, Tim, Perkins recalls fond memories at the former park.
“We were downtown residents for a while, and we enjoyed the former park, so I am excited, as Memphian, to enjoy the new park and to be a part of it,” she says.
