Monarch Café opened its doors Oct. 18 under Victoria and Dillon Seals at 2114 El Dorado Blvd. The café is open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. The couple hopes to bring the Friendswood community together with their cozy new coffee shop.
“We are devoted to serving good coffee,” Victoria said. The café makes each coffee syrup in-house, striving for excellence in every sip. While time-consuming, Monarch plans to go the extra mile. “We want to show a genuine care for the craft,” Victoria adds.
“We want to build a community where people feel like coming here is their safe haven,” Victoria said.
The café highlights its cozy vibe and free wi-fi. “It’s a space to study, or catch up with friends, or both,” Victoria said.
“We want the vibe to be welcoming,” Victoria said. The café is arranged to make guests feel at home using sofas and personal tables.
“Authenticity is really important to us,” Victoria said. The café strives to be a space where people can relax. “It’s a home away from home.”
Monarch offers quality coffee at prices comparable to Starbucks. A flat white at Starbucks averages $6, while Monarch’s is $5. “We’re not focused on making money here. Sure, the money is nice, but the foundation of what we’re doing is to create community within the café,” Victoria said.
The café has a wide range of flavor profiles, from cinnamon to banana. “I think there are so many other beautiful flavor profiles out there that aren’t being utilized,” Victoria said.
For newcomers, she recommends the Painted Lady for those with a sweet tooth. “My personal favorite at the moment, as far as matcha goes, is our Clouded Yellow Matcha, which is a banana matcha,” Victoria said.
Monarch’s main focus is fostering community. “We’d love to start some events within the community,” Victoria said. “Like a run club or getting involved with different churches to have Bible readings.”
The café plans to launch a fall menu with unique flavors, including cranberry, apple and dates. “They’re not done, they’re not overdone,” Victoria said. “It’ll bring specific people here. It’ll be one of the only places you can get cranberry coffee in town.”
Uniqueness and growth inspired Victoria and Dillon to open Monarch. “I know I say community, and it’s so easy to be like, ‘Oh, I just want to create community,’ but it’s a lot deeper than that,” Victoria said, “It’s about creating a home away from home.”
The café’s name honors her late mother, who loved butterflies and their symbolism of metamorphosis. “Taking something ugly or underappreciated and turning it into something beautiful,” Victoria said.
She added, “It’s not always going to be rainbow and sunshine, but it will turn into something beautiful at the end of the day.”
The café has come a long way from where the Seals had planned it. They planned to locate in the Montrose area.
“It didn’t work out, so we started looking for another location, and then we stumbled upon this one, and it was pretty much perfect for what we wanted Monarch to be,” Victoria said on the setbacks Monarch has faced to get to its grand opening.
The plans for Monarch came after Victoria and Dillon ran a coffee cart in October 2024. “We absolutely loved interacting with the community,” Victoria said, “We used that opportunity to test our product.”
“We wanted to see if we had something that sparked interest in the community. Then it did,” Victoria said, “We just decided to be crazy and open a shop.”
Victoria and Dillon have worked every day since August to open Monarch and welcome guests. “We have been here every day, sunup to sundown, working on it,” Victoria said.
Monarch hopes to stand as a symbol of community. “Good vibes, good coffee,” Victoria said.
For more information visit monarchpastriesandcoffeehouse.com, email [email protected] or call (832) 736-7761.
