It started when a TikTok video blew up. As a VC, I'd been noticing the lack of women building AI products, so I posted what was basically a cry for help. Self-nominating to be the Alix Earle of tech. The response was a lot of women in Boston who were already vibe coding on the side, building little projects on their off days and off nights, when they wanted to be doing a lot more, together. They wanted to meet other people building things. Around the same time, Ally Tam Tumasova found me through TikTok, and we aligned on the same thing: not enough women in AI, and the rooms learning this stuff are mostly somewhere else. I knew Café Creations was actually happening when the inbound about the name and the idea kept rolling in. People wanted in.
Vibe coding means you don't have to be technical anymore. What matters is being around people who care about the same things.
A café is a third space, and the best things tend to get made in third spaces. Coworking offices, garages, places where serendipity actually happens. The most accessible third space for that is a café.
Tech is already male-dominated. If you zoom in on AI specifically, the share of women gets smaller. We're women-led because there's a lack of our voices in this room. We're not women-only because we need every perspective that believes in the same mission: innovation makes the world better, and more of us getting our hands in it is the goal.
A good night looks like people walking in not knowing what they want to build, and walking out with something tangible they can show their roommate, their partner, maybe their future customers. It's not learning-and-walking-away. It's experiential learning. Whatever you build that day, you can apply right away. Next time, you come back and keep building on it.