It was a warm summer day when Corey Hammonds and his daughter, Glory, were cleaning out a café space on Buchanan Street.
Corey had originally planned to lease the space to another coffee shop operator. When that plan fell through, he found himself standing in an empty space, trying to figure out what came next.
He knew North Nashville was missing something – he wanted to give the neighborhood a space that felt different. Then, after greeting his daughter, who had tagged along with him that day, with a simple, “Morning, Glory,” the lightbulb went off. The words were simple. The idea wasn’t. Somewhere between cleaning out boxes and figuring out what to do with the space, Morning Glory Cafe was born.
A native Nashvillian, Corey knew the city. He knew real estate. He knew numbers. His background included banking and credit analysis, and he is the owner of The Hammonds Group.
Coffee, though?
That was a different story. When Corey acquired the property off Buchanan Street, he never planned on being the one behind the counter. But the idea of a daddy-and-daughter coffee shop was too good to let go, so he started learning everything he could about the business.
His first call was to a friend. That friend knew a coffee shop owner in Mississippi and once they sat down, it didn’t take long for things to click. “It was divine because we instantly hit it off,” Corey said.
The woman behind that introduction was the owner of Ethnos Coffee, a women-owned coffee company that services more than 25 locations in Mississippi. She gave Corey a menu, recipes and coffee, then sent members of her staff to Nashville to help get Morning Glory up and running. From knowing nothing about coffee to opening the doors took just 45 days. And that was only the beginning.
A Different Kind of Coffee Shop
Walk into Morning Glory and the first thing you’ll notice probably isn’t the coffee – it is the space.
The café has a modern, clean design, with local artwork covering the walls. Rotating exhibitions turn the coffee shop into something of a neighborhood museum, and about every six months, the artwork gets a refresh. And the cherry on top – the artwork is for sale.
A customer can come in for a latte and leave with a piece from a Nashville artist — giving local creatives another place to be seen, and another way to make money from their work. Fun fact, one of our past Urbaanite Summer Interns, Halima Ibrahim, has her artwork currently in the space. That’s exactly the kind of experience Corey had in mind when he opened the doors. “I want them to come into the space and their first impression is ‘this is different,’ especially for North Nashville,” he said. And different doesn’t stop at the artwork.
What’s on the Menu?
Corey started looking for food through the people he already knew. He put the word out to his business contacts that he was looking for products that would pair well with coffee. Soon, people started showing up with something to sell.
Now, Morning Glory works with seven to eight vendors (many women-owned), bringing locally made products into the café alongside its coffee and tea. As for what to order, Corey keeps it classic: a plain vanilla latte is his favorite.
The crowd favorite, though, is the Morning Glory Latte — espresso, honey, and cinnamon. There’s also the Morning Glory Tea, the café’s take on a London Fog, plus cinnamon rolls and juice collaborations.
And if you need a second opinion, our girl and editor, Ashley, has already declared the chai latte to be tea! (Pun intended)
More Than a Place to Grab Coffee
Corey isn’t trying to create another café where people grab a drink and head out. His biggest customer base is business professionals, and he wants Morning Glory to work just as well for a morning meeting as it does for someone settling in with a cup of coffee and nowhere else to be.
Morning Glory sits at the intersection of several things Corey cares about: creating something new in a neighborhood he knows well, giving local artists a place to be seen, working with local vendors, and building a business that people actually want to spend time in.
He wanted people to be comfortable. He just didn’t want comfortable to mean ordinary. “I want you to be comfortable, but also have an experience that you wouldn’t get at another cafe in the city,” he said.
Maybe that’s why the name fits so well. Morning Glory started with Glory.
It started with a dad, his six-year-old daughter, and an empty space Out North. It started with a passing greeting to his baby girl that Corey happened to hear differently that morning.
Now, the name hangs over a coffee shop filled with local art, Nashville vendors, espresso, tea, and people looking for somewhere to land. What began as Corey trying to figure out what to do with a space became a place with a name he had already been saying all along.
“Morning, Glory.”
Interview by: Ashley Currie
Photography: Alexa Battle with Alora Co.
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