Granada cafe owners architect John Isaac Watters and musician Sydney Wayser.
Photo by Justin Chung | Courtesy Granada
Angeleno Heights—For musician Sydney Wayser and architect John Isaac Watters, Granada — the coffee shop they opened in their new back house in Angeleno Heights — began as something they built for themselves: a small space where they and friends could make art and let their creative lives spill outdoors
Watters had lived in the neighborhood for more than 15 years when he introduced Wayser to the “hidden pocket” of Echo Park. She was drawn to its Victorian homes, streetlights and the stories they learned from neighbors.
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“This neighborhood has a special spark to it,” Wayser said.
The couple met at an art event in 2016 and married six years ago. Wayser, a 39-year-old Berklee College of Music graduate, toured as CLARA-NOVA and sang backup for Lorde. Watters studied architecture at USC before becoming a set designer. The 41-year-old recently worked on Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey.”
Before Granada, Wayser had been trying to figure out what came after a life centered on music.
“My entire identity since I was four years old was [that] I am a musician,” she said.
But after the birth of their daughter, Mara, now 3, her priorities changed.
“It’s like there’s Isaac and there’s Mara and those two things come before music.”
Wayser said Granada has been “really grounding and mentally healing,” giving her another creative outlet she shares with her husband and community.
Watters suggested opening a coffee shop after learning they could operate a small food business from home. Wayser initially rejected the idea. Then the couple began watching “The Bear.”
“I was inspired by the passion,” she said.
Two months later, they began planning Granada.
Their property reflects the neighborhood history they value. It was once part of the neighboring Kapsare Cohn House, which served as Los Angeles’ first Jewish hospital, and Wayser believes their pomegranate tree is nearly 100 years old.
Granada has become part of Mara’s childhood, too. Wayser recalled seeing a video of her daughter walking barefoot through the garden carrying a stuffed fox.
“What a cool thing to grow up in,” she remembered thinking.
For Wayser and Watters, Granada has become something they never set out to build: a new creative life rooted in a neighborhood they already loved.
“We can’t imagine living anywhere else in the city,” Wayser said.
Magnolia LaFleur is a Los Angeles-based journalist as well as a contemporary fine artist whose work has been exhibited in galleries and museums.
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