Some believe adaptogenic mushrooms reduce stress on the body and help clear the way for creative thought. If that seems useful as you start your morning, a new “mushroom coffee” cafe coming to Capitol Hill could be for you.

Capitol Hill cupcake and pot cookie entrepreneur Jody Hall is making plans to transform E Pike’s Cupcake Royale into a new flagship showcase for Wunderground, her startup coffee company dedicated to blends of beans and ground adaptogenic mushrooms like Lion’s Mane, Chaga, Reishi, and Cordyceps.

“Coffee is our creativity,” the newly launched company’s marketing begins. “Wanting to make it wunderful inspired us. We sourced beans we feel great about, grown on smallholder farms by farmers we believe in. We roasted exactly a bagazillion beans to find the perfect balance to pair with our adaptogenic mushrooms and taste incredible.”

But “helping people be creative,” the company says, will be its actual product.

Paperwork filed with the city shows plans to transform the E Pike Cupcake Royale cafe and bakeshop into a new Wunderground Cafe as a centerpiece to the new startup which has already begun online sales of its blends including Brainchild — with with Lion’s Mane and Cordyceps to provide what the company says are cognitive health benefits — and Hocus Pocus with Chaga and Reishi to purportedly boost the immune system. Other products include instant versions of the company’s blends and also mushroom-free beans.

Meanwhile, CHS is told Hall is seeking a new location nearby for a smaller Capitol Hill home for Cupcake Royale.

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The Seattle entrepreneur built the cupcake company into a citywide phenomenon after opening the E Pike location, that company’s largest, in the summer of 2009.

In 2015 as the state’s cannabis laws were relaxed, Hall made waves when she applied for a permit to sell pot. While that opportunity fell through, her efforts to create I-502 friendly edibles took off. In 2018, her Goodship startup was purchased by Seattle-based private equity firm Privateer Holdings.

Wunderground, meanwhile, is starting with even larger ambitions thanks to near $4 million in investment offerings according to federal Security and Exchange Commission filings and a branding and marketing strategy from Paper Crane Factory, an advertising firm from Seattle creative Cal McAllister.

As for E Pike’s new Wunderground headquarters, we don’t know more about timing on the underway project or a new location for the cupcake shop.

You can learn more at wundergroundcoffee.com.

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