Flannel Donut

Production in Full Bloom + Studio Update

It’s been a busy stretch behind the scenes, which is why last week’s update never quite made it out the door 🙃 The Studio Café continues to take shape, but progress lately has moved well beyond design renderings and menu planning. Those boxes have long since been checked. What we’re focused on now is building the programming and infrastructure that will actually bring the space to life. We’re developing film3 workshops, events, and screenings—things designed to get filmmakers, technologists, and ...

Flannel Donut Studio Café: Building Local, Thinking Global

Rob is fresh off another Emmy win for The Tiny Chef Show — and after a long weekend of catching up, celebrating, and planning, we couldn't be more energized about what's coming this spring. We're opening Flannel Donut Studio Café so soon! We can't wait to dive into small, local, and from the heart storytelling — knowing full well that's actually where viral and global live too. After nearly half a decade in the global film3 space — building, traveling, learning, doing, workshopping, teaching...

Emmys, Agents, and a Feature Film Walk Into a Café

It's been one of those weeks where you look up and realize: everything is happening at the same time, and somehow, that's exactly right. An Emmy was won. An AI agent keeps outdoing itself. A feature film is taking shape. And our doors are almost open. We wouldn't have it any other way. First, A Massive Congratulations Flannel Donut @Flannel_Donut nailed it @rob_shaw_anim 6 8:43 AM • Mar 6, 2026 We have to pause and celebrate our co-founder Rob Shaw, who won an Emmy Award last week. The Tiny Che...

New Hire at the Stop Motion Studio Café

Over the last few months, these articles have been largely centered around Studio Café progress: Equipment lists, menu refinements, the countdown to opening day. And all of that is still happening — the build continues, the set is taking shape, the coffee is sourced. PLUS we are very much in production as we write this. But this week we need to talk about something else. Something that changed how we operate. Meet Auctobot 🐙 🎬 Our producer agent at the studio. Three Weeks, One Mac Mini, and ...

Espresso Machine Goes Here, Everything Else is a Choice

There's a particular kind of clarity that only comes from walking a space over and over (and over) again. Not looking at blueprints. Not tweaking and retweaking spreadsheets. Actually walking it — standing where the espresso machine will go, sitting where a customer will sit, imagining the camera capturing another tiny movement across an 800 sq set surrounded by customers. This past week, that's exactly what we did. And what came out of it was the beginning of a real operating picture for Flannel Donut.

Happy 1st Birthday FD 🎉

Another Great Week We sat down with our new pastry chef first thing last Monday morning, walked through equipment specs, menu concepts, and talked about how to bring the same creative energy from our animation sets into the café kitchen. She came up with a brilliant concept to run themed menu items alongside different projects, brand partnerships, and seasonal collaborations. Imagine pastries that reflect the personality of whatever we’re creating on set. It’s exactly the kind of playful, integrated approach we love at Flannel Donut.

Building Flannel Donut: Where Stop Motion Meets Steam and Sugar

Something big is taking shape in downtown Portland — and it's not just another coffee shop. Flannel Donut Studio Café is becoming more real by the day, and this past week might have been our most productive yet. With our April 1st opening rapidly approaching, every decision we make now is laying the foundation for something Portland hasn't seen before: a working stop motion animation studio fused with a café experience designed to spark creativity in everyone who walks through the door. Here's to the beginning of something special!

The Infrastructure Week

RECAP! On Thursday, we moved mountains. Literally. Our set designer, Kyle Arneson, drove his workshop essentials—equipment, tools, materials, and machinery—964 miles north to our sweet little village of Portland, Oregon, home of the world's best and brightest stop motion animators. We're talking about a highly specialized craftsman relocating his life's work because he believes in what we're building. As of Saturday, the Studio Café was no longer an empty space we dreamed about. When that truck pulled up, we knew this was real.

From Daily Rituals to Feature Films

Welcome to our Studio Café If you’ve been following along, you know our soon-to-open Studio Cafe is a public experiment in running multiple creative worlds under one roof. Inside, there’s a working animation studio and a neighborhood café. Production and hospitality. Process and pastries. All happening in plain sight, in downtown Portland’s most walkable neighborhood — the Pearl District. People — especially Portlanders — don’t just want coffee. They need it. What they get here is something more...

Studio Café Meets $StopMo Utility

Earlier this week, the new renderings and design explorations have landed, and with them, a clearer sense of how this space functions daily as a shared workflow made visible to the public. The latest designs are built for daily storytelling, offering a flexible environment that doubles as a backdrop for collaboration and passive branding without feeling staged. Zones are defined without feeling closed off. The café reads as welcoming and exciting, while the studio side remains deeply creative.