PAUSE | Café & Espresso Bar

Quite pricey for small portions. Lovely space, although laptops aren’t allowed on every table. It also seems suitable for intimate meetings. The service was good.

The ambience is quite great and so are the beverages, but my experience here was not palatable regarding how a customer is perceived. Upon getting to the cafe, i had my sit and a waitress in accosted me asking if i intend to use my PC (laptop), I answered affirmative and she pointed out the table i'm seated is a no laptop table. I tried to understand why this was the case as i've been there sometimes last year and she said this is a new order from her boss. I followed up asking her where the laptop tables are and she pointed to the stool chair section. Some minutes later, another customer walked in and was accosted equally about not using a laptop. I was still chilling going through the menu and oops raised my head to see another customer, this time a "white lady" seated and working with her laptop. I spent a few minutes observing if she was gonna be accosted but that was not the case, I was literarily infuriated. I gave it couple more minutes and it was obvious that she was never going to be accosted. This is COLORISM in plain terms. I originally intended to leave without saying a word but felt i might be overthinking this and decided to mention to another waitress what my experience was like. She tried explaining to me why they don't allow laptops on some tables which i mentioned to her makes sense and was not the my bone of contention, my issue was simple, what's good for the goose (black person) isn't it good for the gander (white person)? She further went on to explain the white lady was allowed to us her laptop because she's sitting a table with 2 seats and ii was seated at the couch section. If that's admitted without conceding, i mentioned again to her the other customer (black person) that walked in and was accosted about the no laptop too is seated on a table with 2 seats just like the white lady. She finally mentioned if there was another table that seats two persons i would be allowed to use my laptop there. I consider this an "afterthought" as the first waitress clearly stated to me the stool chair section is the only PC allowed section of the cafe. As much as the second waitress apologised, "explained" was making effort to make me feel better, she clearly dint understand my problem is the Colorism i experienced not about where laptop can be used or not.
To a lot of people who don't pay attention, this is not gonna be an issue or the might not even notice but that's not the case for me.
Finally, my experience can be summarised as the waitresses are comfortable to enforce the rules of the house on black people but are apprehensive and reluctant to do that to a white person.
I honestly do hope the management of Pause cafe can take this feedback seriously and not come back with the general and default "we viewed our CCTV" response like most restaurants do today as i believe their intention would not align with my experience at the cafe.

This is such a lovely place to spend a few hours or even your entire day. Trust me, you won't want to leave. It's such a perfectly relaxing space that nothing measures up. As for the laptop table rule, it's pretty explicit and easy to understand even on your first visit so I don't see why people are making such a fuss about it on here. As for the allegations of racism, all the service staff are black and were perfectly polite to me, a black man. It's a lovely place, like i said before.

The staff didn’t allow a Nigerian use their so called no-laptop table pointed the person to the uncomfortable table but allowed a white person use the so called non laptop table.

Yummy food, solid wifi, service is friendly but can be on the slower side (15 minutes for avocado toast). Some tables are no laptops allowed

Had the goat cheese toast and bbq chicken pizza on this visit, the smoked salmon toast is also quite nice.

Pause is a small cafe tucked away in the Palms Shopping Mall plaza in Oniru. It’s a nice spot for a coffee date with select laptop friendly tables for remote work. I had the basil, lemon, and ginger lemonade while I worked and it was so good I ordered a 2nd one to go.

Nice place. We went for an evening drink. Nice ambience, good service. It is a good place for work also. We can done both inside and outside.

Went to unwind and work! Perfect scenery! Love Pause Cafe.

Beautiful space. Prompt service and a good place to work from if you don’t want to work form an actual office space.

Brilliant place to eat and get some work done. Locks you away from Lagos madness!

Serene environment, great cafe to work from. Services are good too.

Nice ambience. A very comfortable environment to work as well as chill

Really welcoming staff, I loved the calm music in the background. Milkshakes were 🔥. Muffins - 6/10. They have snacks too. Pay close attention when picking out water, I mistakenly took sparkling water instead of regular water, it looks alike.
I was able to get enough work done in the space. Try go with an extension if you have things to charge cause you might not get lucky to sit near the socket.

Very cozy space. The food is really great, and the staff are very helpful and kind.
It’s a great spot for breakfast, and for working outside the home or office.

You have cool indoor or sea breeze outdoor with free wifi while you Pause to snack.

Good (ish) service and atmosphere but wifi lasts only 3 hours

An outstanding cafe that's worthy of its claim 'Cafe & Espresso Bar.'

The exterior was impressive with the cute mint/yellow color combination and the atmosphere was so welcoming and warm, a perfect place for a brunch as well as a glass of chilled beer after work (not sure what beer they serve since they still didn't have their Bar menu in place).

We had the brownie, which was pretty good, chocolate milkshake, also nice, and cappuccino, which was 'from decent to good' (our expectation was perhaps mountain high for their coffee but the latte art 'enjoy' was a detail that put a big smile on my face).

At the corner, they had ready-to-eat samdwiches and stuff although I found them a bit too pricey; and their dessert section was eye-pleasant.

They had wifi and the staff was welcoming and warm. Definitely going back and I guess this place will hype soon.

(Pictures taken with Samsung Galaxy Flip3)

Initially the vibe wasn't super welcoming like at other cafe's in Lagos, but I mentioned this to the staff and they did make up for it. A nice, cold place to work, good wifi connection (no hassle about getting the password), great parking obviously because it's in the Palms shopping center, and the selling point for me - great chai latte's.