After we left CannaCon St. Louis, we wanted to stop and get something to eat that was close by and was not a fast food chain. We found this place called “The Cobblestone STL” at 701 1st st St. Louis on Laclede’s Landing. It is a coffee shop/sandwich shop/community market. The upstairs is comprised of a seating area with a coffee bar tucked in the back corner of the upper floor. At the coffee bar is also where you order your food items and pay for the community market items if the downstairs register is not open. Downstairs is the market which showcases quite a few local items and pieces of artwork from local artists. Along with local items you can find a decent selection of items to purchase.
You could order your lunch upstairs, while it is being prepared, you can shop for dinner without leaving the building. I ordered the roast beef sandwich with double meat on gluten free bread, Vanna ordered a Cherry BBQ Club Crunch Sandwich Wrap on gluten free tortilla. The wrap was supposed to consist of Tender turkey, lettuce, tomato, onion, cheddar cheese, and our homemade ranch, topped with a hearty layer of Michigan Cherry BBQ chips wrapped in a toasted flour tortilla. The gluten free wrap did not hold together well in the panini press and so Vanna opted for the gluten free bread to replace the wrap that fell apart. My roast beef sandwich came with Roast beef, provolone, pickles, caramelized onion, horseradish aioli, and a side of Au Jus on a ciabatta bun. Gluten free bread was substituted for the ciabatta bun.
Since it was not busy the food was ready in about seven minutes. This provided us ample time to browse the other offerings in the store. On the table near the steps you will find local brands that are being highlighted. Continuing that local theme, artwork is also displayed along the walls of the lower floor. You will also find canned goods to frozen foods and sodas to wine. We sis our food and head to check out the attached art gallery.
To the left of the deli counter you will find a door that leads to Art Fusion Gallery. We walk in and was greeted by Davide Weaver, who is the events director for the gallery. We started on the lower floor of the gallery. We took note of the series of paintings that displayed the damage from the tornado that hit St. Louis. There were various mediums hung along the walls of the lower floor of the gallery. One artist had painted electric guitars while another artist painted images that had an inflated sex doll as a parade balloon. The lower floor of the gallery includes a small raised stage that allows space for performances.
Chairs were arranged in the main area for seating during performances.
After making a trip around the room we were gathering our stuff to leave when Davide told us there is an upstairs. Well sign us up to check this out. The area was roped off to prevent people from wandering up there as it was closed. When we get upstairs we noticed more art hanging on the wall. Artwork could be found on almost every wall upstairs. Upstairs contains meeting spaces that you can rent along with a multipurpose area. As we wonder around upstairs checking out the meeting rooms and member’s only lounge area, Davide asked us if we wanted to see something cool? He leads us to the multipurpose area that was not cleaned up because they had a group use the area the night before. Near the wall is a giant model of the Death Star from Star Wars. That’s just tip of the iceburg, as we moved closer to the model we noticed that is comprised of Star Wars figurines that reenacted scenes from the movies. Great detail was put into the artwork.
Art Fusion and The Cobblestone are two gems hidden in plan sight. One is a community store/quick coffee/small deli and the other feature a full gallery with artist submitted works.
If you are looking for something to do 9/24/26 at 6pm there will be a closing party at Art Fusion.
