PHX Cat Cafe has opened a north Phoenix location. Here’s a look inside

Cat lovers of the Valley are getting a new spot to meet some furry friends.

PHX Cat Cafe has opened a second location in north Phoenix, offering more space for its resident felines to interact with locals who can’t get enough of them.

The 8,200-square-foot space at 4330 W. Union Hills Drive held a soft opening this week. It’s a sizable step up from the non-profit cafe’s popular downtown Phoenix location, with a similar mix of cats and coffee.

A grand opening of the north Phoenix location is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday.

CEO and co-founder Carrie Schwartz says PHX Cat Cafe’s expansion was driven by demand and a push to do more with the its rescue mission.

“We’ve been growing over the past four years we’ve been in the downtown Phoenix location and we saw an opportunity where we had the support and we had the funds to open a second location,” Schwartz says. “It’s a bit bigger, which means we can help more than double the cats,” Schwartz says.

A bigger, busier cat lounge

Schwartz estimates the new spot is a third larger than PHX Cat Cafe’s original location at Garfield and First streets, allowing the spot to house more cats.

“Downtown, we typically have between 25 and 30 cats in the lounge at a time. At out new north location, we will have about 35 to 40 cats,” Schwartz says. “So we’ll be able to make a bigger impact, especially in the colonies we pull a lot of our cats from. And we’ll also be able to do a lot of more of our in-house medical, more space for isolation and treatment.”

The north Phoenix location will start with about 35 cats, many coming from rough conditions.

“Most of them are different colonies that we either help care for or people that are our volunteers help care for. Right now, the bulk of our cats at the new location all came from a single trailer park in north Phoenix,” Schwartz says.

Others were pulled from other organizations from throughout Arizona.

“We brought in 12 cats from (Yuma animal shelter) because they have such a high kill rate and can’t turn anybody away,” Schwartz says. “So we took some of their adults off of their hands so that they have room for kitten season.”

Inside, the cafe’s cat lounge is a playground of ramps, shelves and other perches, each allowing rescue cats to climb, hide and even judge you from above.

“It’s a little bit higher. We have some kind of cool different shelves where we have this pole that goes up in the middle of the room. So we have some walkways that go from the side of the room out to the middle of the room to that pole so they can make a circle around the room,” Schwartz says.

And yes, there’s a full catwalk.

“It goes all the way around the edge of the room so they can hang out up there and walk along and interact with people when they want and take naps when they don’t. Or maybe look down in judgment sometimes.”

Like the cafe’s downtown Phoenix location, Arizona designer and “cat style expert” Kate Benjamin of Hauspanther worked with owners to shape the lounge’s design.

The human-focused amenities also got an upgrade at the new location. Schwartz says the cafe’s coffee bar, which serves espresso drinks, tea and smoothies, includes actual seating outside the cat lounge.

“We were actually able to plan out the new location so there’s some breathing room. People can come in and enjoy the coffee and not feel like they have to go in to see the cats,” Schwartz says.

Big windows look into the lounge, so you can sip and watch if you’re not ready to commit.

From Tempe cat cafe to Valley rescue hub

PHX Cat Cafe didn’t start in north Phoenix. Or even downtown.

The concept traces back to 2017, when co-founder Missy Pruitt opened La Gattara Cat Cafe in Tempe. That location closed in April 2020 during COVID, but the idea stuck.

In January 2022, Pruitt and Schwartz reopened the cafe in downtown Phoenix. In March 2023, Pruitt parted ways with the business to focus on personal matters and Schwartz took over as the main owner. The cafe was rebranded as PHX Cat Cafe later that year.

Since then, it’s grown into something more than a hangout.

PHX Cat Cafe is the only nonprofit cat cafe in Arizona that also operates as a rescue. Most cafes partner with shelters. This one is the shelter.

That means the job isn’t just cuddles and coffee.

“A lot of people especially will say to my employees, ‘Oh, your job’s so cool. You play with cats all day.’ And they’re like, ‘I clean all day,’” Schwartz says. “They’re constantly doing litter boxes and cleaning water bowls and food bowls and wiping down shelves in order to make sure the cats stay as healthy as they can in the kindergarten classroom that they basically live in.”

PHX Cat Café

4330 W. Union Hills Drive, Suite B010