DOZENS OF WAYS EXIST to turn a handful of roasted beans into a cup of coffee, but espresso has specific requirements: The coffee grounds must be subjected to hot, pressurized water that is forced (hence “expressed”) through those grinds, usually utilizing steam. 

This process originated in Italy in the late 19th century, and the first espresso machines were invented somewhere between 1901 and 1903. Since then, an explosion of creativity and ingenuity (probably caffeine fueled) has resulted in innumerable models of espresso machines, wondrous in their variability and design. Many of the rarest ones reside in an unassuming brick building in Seattle, the Bakke Coffee Museum.

Mysteriously anonymous from the street (the museum has been open for four years but still has no sign), inside is a wonderland of distinctive, one-of-a-kind machinery, an engineer and coffee lover’s fever dream. Visiting is like perusing a gallery of strange evolution, in which each specimen solved the problem of making coffee in different, sometimes odd ways.

Appropriately located in the city that’s practically synonymous with coffee, the museum is the culmination of founder Kent Bakke’s lifelong love affair with the stuff. Bakke is the retired former head of La Marzocco, an Italian-founded company whose espresso machines have graced the countertops of coffee shops and restaurants all over the world since 1927. 

The Ballard neighborhood building that houses the museum was previously home to Stewart Marine Engine & Machine Works, and was originally purchased as a storage space for the La Marzocco USA headquarters next door. It now showcases the bulk of Bakke’s collection of espresso machines, along with numerous coffee grinders, roasting devices and assorted paraphernalia used to convert bean to cup.

Displays here span the history of espresso machines, from their earliest days as vertical metal boilers to the sleek horizontal beasts of the present day.

At any given time, some 20-30 models glitter on pedestals in the museum proper, accompanied by informational plaques. Many of them are outfitted with features that go well beyond mere utilitarianism, such as glowing lights, decorative motifs and gleeful metallic frippery. A few are massive sculptures that happen to make coffee. Some midcentury ones have wings and luscious curves like cars of that era. Bakke owns one styled and named after bodacious Italian film star Gina Lollobrigida. 

Bakke amassed the collection piece by piece over the decades he spent traveling back and forth between Seattle and Italy. Today the vast majority of it is housed in the basement under the museum, where it can be seen during an Indiana Jones-like tour experience available on request.

Visitors can’t sample the different espressos made by each machine, as the majority of them aren’t currently functional. At least one or two are always ready to pull shots, though. 

An in-house machine shop is also on full display at the museum. At least one model is always on the doctor’s table being coaxed back to life. 

The interior mechanisms of the machines at the Bakke museum are remarkably idiosyncratic. One reason for this, according to Bakke, is that many of the often small companies that created them came up with creative ways to squirm around expensive patents. 

A lot of companies that once made espresso machines no longer exist. “Every so often the machine will show up that no one has never heard of,” Bakke says. “You’ll find a particular model that you didn’t know existed or a modification on the technology. There’s always something more to learn.”