Shop by craft
Best of Milwaukee; search or filter for all 10
Milwaukee / United States
Gilles is a Wisconsin frozen custard stand, opened by Paul Gilles in 1938 and still run by the Linscott family from the 1950s-era building on West Bluemound Road. Alongside cones, shakes, and a flavor of the day, the stand sells bulk custard and packaged treats and takes online orders for its drive-thru pickup window.
Best for Cones, shakes, and flavor-of-the-day frozen custard from Wisconsin's oldest custard stand
Milwaukee / United States
Boswell Book Company is a full-service independent bookstore on North Downer Avenue in Milwaukee, known for a busy calendar of in-store author events and shelves of staff recommendations. Beyond books it stocks gifts, puzzles, and its own branded merchandise, with online ordering through IndieCommerce.
Best for Bookstore, Books, Gifts
Milwaukee / United States
Colectivo has roasted in Milwaukee's Riverwest since 1993 and now runs a dozen cafes across the city plus locations in Madison and Chicago. The online shop carries fair-trade and single-origin coffees, cold brew, and subscriptions, backed by its Troubadour bakery and a grocery store network.
Best for Fair-trade coffee, cold brew and Troubadour bakery
Milwaukee / United States
Founded in a former Riverwest bakery in 1987, Lakefront Brewery pours Riverwest Stein, New Grist, and a rotating lineup from its Milwaukee beer hall on North Commerce Street. Visitors can take its famous brewery tour, grab beer to go, and shop clothing, drinkware, and home goods through its online store.
Best for Brewery, Craft Beer, Beer Hall
Milwaukee / United States
Leon's Frozen Custard has served its vanilla, chocolate, and daily special flavors from the same South 27th Street stand since 1942, still owned and operated by the founding family. The neon-lit drive-in keeps a full soda fountain and a short sandwich menu, and sells its custard by the pint and half-gallon to take home.
Best for Vanilla, chocolate, and daily-special frozen custard from a neon-lit drive-in stand running
Milwaukee / United States
Purple Door scoops more than two hundred rotating ice cream flavors from its Walker's Point flagship and a satellite stand at Mequon Public Market, churning small batches with local ingredients. Pints of favorites like Salted Caramel and Brandy Old Fashioned are sold in the shops, at grocers, and online.
Best for Ice Cream, Scoop Shop, Pints
Milwaukee / United States
Sprecher has fire-brewed craft sodas and beer in the Milwaukee area since 1985, best known for a root beer once named the country's best. Its Glendale taproom and gift shop sell bottles, cans, and merch, and the online store ships variety packs, soda extract, and seasonal flavors nationwide.
Best for Craft Soda, Root Beer, Brewery
Milwaukee / United States
Stone Creek Coffee roasts to order six days a week in Milwaukee, printing a 3-to-14-day freshness window on every bag. A B Corp since 2020, it ships same-day for 1pm orders and runs eight area cafés.
Best for Stone Creek Coffee roasts to order six days a week in Milwaukee
Stone Creek Coffee roasts six days a week at its Factory site in Milwaukee, and backs that schedule with a freshness discipline printed directly on the packaging: every bag carries its actual roast date, with the company recommending a three-to-fourteen-day window after roasting as the coffee's best drinking period. That transparency extends to the business's own structure, a Benefit Corporation since 2020 and B Lab-certified in early 2022, credentials the company ties to a stated focus on neighborhood reinvestment through programs like Project EAT. The café network spans eight locations across the Milwaukee metro, from the Factory Café and a Downer Avenue location within the city itself out to Shorewood, Glendale and Whitefish Bay on the North Shore, and Wauwatosa, Delafield and Oconomowoc to the west, a genuinely metro-wide footprint rather than a single flagship with satellite kiosks. Roasting decisions run partly through a rotating weekly program called ONE Coffee, credited on the site to three staff members by first name, Eric, Jes and Kelly, and orders placed by 1pm ship the same day, roasted to order rather than pulled from standing inventory.
Milwaukee / United States
The Village Cheese Shop is a European-inspired specialty store in Wauwatosa Village stocking more than eighty artisan cheeses cut to order, plus cured meats, a 300-bottle wine selection, and gourmet pantry goods. Cheesemongers guide tastings at the counter, and shoppers can order online or join the monthly cheese and wine clubs.
Best for Cheese Shop, Wine, Charcuterie, Specialty Food
Milwaukee / United States
Wisconsin Cheese Mart has been a family-owned cheese store in Milwaukee for more than eighty-five years, curating cheddars, goudas, curds, and specialty wheels from makers across the state. Its shops in Milwaukee and Madison are backed by a robust online store shipping cheese, sausage, Pine River spreads, and gift crates.
Best for Cheese Shop, Wisconsin Cheese, Sausage, Gifts
Neighbourhood walks
Area names come from each shop’s published address record; ORBIS does not invent neighbourhoods.
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