Hilltop Coffee

Featuring carefully curated coffee and teas.

Our expansive menu is reflective of the never-ending search for rich flavors and uncompromising quality.

About Us: From Howard to Hilltop

Joy and Rashad met Freshman year of 1996 at Howard University in a Humanities Class. Throughout the semester they developed a friendship and helped each other acclimate to freshman life. After the semester ended, they lost contact and hadn't seen each other the rest of their tenure at Howard.

Twenty-five years later, they reconnected and discovered a mutual love of coffee, which led to the idea of opening a coffee shop on the beloved college campus that they hold so dear. Their passion for exploring unique coffee shops all over the world led them to create a place that offers an exceptional coffee experience, with a focus on quality and sustainability.

Naturally, their coffee shop needed to represent something symbolic to Howard.

Joy and Rashad created Hilltop Coffee as an homage to the iconic print circulation newspaper and daily online publication, “The Hilltop.” As the nation’s oldest black collegiate newspaper, The Hilltop provides critical and enlightening news to the Howard University community and the Washington, DC Metro area. Founded by renowned author, Zora Neale Hurston in 1924, they wanted to highlight the importance of her gift to Howard by honoring The Hilltop.