West Lafayette review

Over spring break my family and I spent a weekend in West Lafayette. My mom spent a portion of her childhood there, and we thought it would be nice to visit. Her mom still lives within a half-hour drive of West Lafayette.

We drove about an hour and a half to the Hilton Garden Inn hotel. It was super cold the weekend we went, so we did not enjoy walking around as much as we would have liked. 

There were a good number of boba places around and we ended up at 朝茶 TSAō·CHA. It is a bubble tea, fried chicken, egg waffle brand with about 13 locations. They have self-checkout screens and they are easy to order from. They allow customization of sweetness, milk, toppings, ice, etc. They stay open till 10 p.m. which is nice and has cute decor. They are somewhat pricey at $5.25 per drink, but the cups are large.

For dinner, we went to Revolution Barbeque which was about 5 minutes from our hotel. They are a family-owned and operated restaurant with everything from pickled vegetables to pie and, of course, barbeque. To order, they have a large chalkboard menu and customers put in their orders with the cashier. There was Pop Art and a comfortable, urban sense to the place.  

There are also a couple of assorted shops that my mom remembered going to as a teenager. Amused is a vintage store and it is very hip. Going down the entrance staircase, the store is basically a basement. They had a wide range of clothing styles and such. 

Von’s Shops are another familiar place for my mom. They have Von’s book shop and Von’s clothing which are next door to each other and connected. The bookstore has tall shelves filled to the brim with all genres of books like poetry, languages, and dream interpretation. The clothing store has many simple staples and plenty of bold pieces, as well as trendy hobo bags. The stores also hold a large collection of crystals and beads which are beautiful. 

I truly enjoyed my trip to West Lafayette and seeing where my mom spent her days when she was a kid. It was surprisingly trendy and was a real hoot. I would like to go again when it is warmer so we can actually walk around and take in the sights instead of sprinting from our car to any warm building.