Café con piernas

A more conservative café con piernas in Santiago, December 2010

Café con piernas (literally, Spanish for "coffee with legs") is a coffee shop style popular in Chile where the service staff consists of females dressed in clothing considered to be revealing.[1] Coffee shops with waitresses serving in miniskirts and heels to businessmen had long been popular, but bikinis and similar attire accelerated the trend by the mid-1990s. The shops are very numerous and popular in Santiago.[2][3][4][5][6] It is frequently noted that the shops seem to contradict Chile's traditionally conservative culture.[7][8] Generally the women walk on a raised catwalk behind the bar so as to maximize the view for patrons.[8] Not all locations feature women in bikinis or lingerie, some have stayed with the traditional miniskirt and heels. Three well known café con piernas chains in Chile are Cafe do Brasil, Cafe Caribe and Cafe Haiti.[7]

References

  1. ↑ Gallardo, Eduardo (13 October 1998). Coffee With Legs' Offends Some Chilean Sensibilities, Kentucky New Era (Associated Press)
  2. ↑ Flinn, John (12 February 2006). Out on a limb for coffee with legs, San Francisco Chronicle
  3. ↑ Chong, Kevin (28 May 2010). Santiago: A city with legs, Toronto Star
  4. ↑ Heather Murphy (September 17, 2008). "A Little Skin With Your Latte?". National Public Radio. Retrieved March 9, 2010.
  5. ↑ Adam Fuller and Jason Snyder (August 1, 2008). "CAFÉ CON PIERNAS: GOOD 'TIL THE LAST DROP". The Santiago Times. Retrieved March 9, 2010.
  6. ↑ CAFÉ CON PIERNAS: ¡QUÉ SABOR!, chile.com (in Spanish), Retrieved March 22, 2011
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Ossa, Felipe (5 May 2000). Cafes ... with legs, Salon.com
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 (12 August 2003). Cafe With Legs Sizzles In Uptight Chile, Philippine Daily Inquirer, p. A1, A13

See also