Hostess heads back to the past with cafe

Lucie Mountain, former air hostess for Eastern Airways, will be opening the doors of Cockpit Cafe on December 2. The cafe will draw inspiration from the 1950s and Ms Mountain’s passion for travel.

Ms Mountain has a background in street food with Crepe Lucette. The business goes around to various events serving up crepes.

However, she told The Yorkshire Post that the venture is “very seasonal” and that she wanted to do something a bit more permanent.

“I’ve been doing it for six years and its very seasonal,” she said. “I wanted to do something that I could grow.”

The ambitious food entrepreneur says she chose the 1950s as a theme because it was such a “colourful” and “innocent” era.

She added: “It was glamorous to be an airline hostess in the 1950s and only people with money could afford to go on holiday. It’s a fun era and also it was an era when it was fun to fly.”

Ms Mountain is looking to provide escapism with The Cockpit Cafe.

People find it hard to switch off thanks to modern technology, says Ms Mountain, and she hopes the cafe will get people interacting with each other more.

She hopes to encapsulate some of the positivity of the era with World War II having just ended.

“This is just a great place to escape to,” Ms Mountain added.

Music will be a key part of The Cockpit Cafe as Ms Mountain looks to establish the business as a “destination”.

“Our plan is to have a pianist come in on Saturdays so we can have live music,” she said.

Ms Mountain added that there would also be a focus on 40s and 50s jazz and swing music. She is also looking at throwing a bit of electro swing into the mix.

“It doesn’t matter where you come from, it’s just a bit of fun,” she says.

The aviation themed cafe is aiming to look high end but wants to remain affordable.

Ms Mountain said: “It’s not about reinventing the wheel but looking to do something a bit different. We want to look high end but we don’t want to be charging high end prices.”

The quirky venue will look to serve food and drink from all over the world once it opens on December 2. On the children’s menu, the cafe will offer sandwiches made in the shape of aircrafts.

Before setting up her own street food business Ms Mountain worked for Eastern Airways. She was an air hostess from 2003 until 2005. Ms Mountain then left the airline to go travelling but returned in 2007 as a marketing manager. In 2011 she set up Crepe Lucette.

Despite setting up the cafe to mitigate the seasonality of her street food business, Ms Mountain has ambitious plans for the cafe and hopes to create a well-known brand.

“There’s so many avenues we could easily go down,” Ms Mountain says, “diversifying into so many things.”

She added: “In my mind this was never going to be a small idea. I don’t necessarily want to be a millionaire but I’ve got big ambitions for it.”

The business will take “baby steps” in its expansion but Ms Mountain is already eyeing further locations with Leeds being a target city.

Take-off for aviation themed cafe

The cafe will create 15 jobs once it opens its doors in Beverley, East Yorkshire.

Lucie Mountain also plans on taking the aviation themed concept to offices and other events.

The Cockpit Cafe has secured a couple of cockpit trolleys from airlines from which it can serve food on wheels. The actual decor of the cafe will also hark back to the 1950s.

In the evening, the cafe will transform into a bar, serving a range of alcoholic beverages including beer, cocktails, wines and spirits.

The Cockpit Cafe will stock its own-brand coffee and craft ale.