Apparently it was an old motorbike showroom/workshop back in the day. Nowadays, it is a cafe and bar conveniently located a few steps away from Melbourne Central.
It looks hipster, but not too cool. THe friendly staff would assure you of that. As for food and drinks, it is all delivered in generous portions at a reasonable price.

I'm a huge fan of this place.

Management changed a few years ago and this place has only gone up hill since. Most of the hipsters have left for greener pastures (Brunswick) and we are left with great food, decent choice of drinks and a business that is no long cash only. Win!

Watch out for some pretty awesome deals on food and drink here as well. Coffee is $2.50 before 10am here which is also great, no skim milk here. They also have $2.50 pots of beer and $9 burgers on Tuesdays.

Quite unique. A bit hipster & artsy, but interesting and not alienating. This place is particularly striking due to its size - considering it is in the CBD, and not particularly luxe, the place is enormous. It has a retro/school feel, with leather back banquettes, retro 60s chairs etc. It is a comfortable and casual place. There is a gallery/art space towards the back and lots of comfy lounge chairs & tables. Would be a good place to casually do some reading or work (if you're the type of person who likes to work in cafes - heaps of space here & good atmosphere for it too). The food is OK and coffee is decent.

I've heard a lot about this cafe and I had a high expectation. While my experience was slightly lower than my expectation, I still liked the atmosphere. It was quite stylish. The staff was nice and the coffee was good. I think I would make another visit soon to have a meal.

To be perfectly honest, I've never eaten there. However, it's a regular coffee place for me and I've never been served a mediocre one. Those baristas really know what they're doing!

They have free wifi and very comfy couches and chairs, so it's mostly populated by uni students so the whole vibe is very hipster (there's also an exhibition space in there). The music is quite loud and it can get a bit crowded. If you're not averse to arts students and you like your coffee, you'll fit right in.

From its woefully tiny one-stove kitchen, through its shabby blanket-draped couches to its unmatchably ditzy service, 1000 Pound Bend fairly screams 'student hangout'. And, unless you are student with low expectations, you probably want to avoid this place. My partner and I dropped in for lunch on the weekend and it's not exaggerating to say that this was possibly the worst Melbourne cafe experience we've ever had.

It was fairly busy, there's no denying, and we were warned there was a half-hour wait for food. OK, fair enough - at least they acknowledged that the pokey kitchen and the single cook didn't have a hope in hell of keeping up with the orders. Well, we figured by the time we'd had a coffee, the half hour would have elapsed so we ordered a light meal.

I'd like to be able to rate the food - for all I know it was fine. But we never got ours. After fifty minutes and no sign of anything we went to find out what was happening. Incredibly, it appears that our meal had been taken to the wrong table, where two people who hadn't even ordered food accepted it as theirs. Since the table service apparently has absolutely no rhyme or reason about it, the woman who delivered the food was completely oblivious to the stuff up. She shuffled over to our table with a refund of our meal money because - yes that's right - there was likely to be another long wait if we wanted to eat.

This place has the effect of being vibey and busy, but if you look around the truth of the matter becomes pretty apparent. The tables are, for the most part, clogged up with 2-cool-4-school wannabees sucking up the free wifi and ordering a coffee every hour to stake their claim. Evidently, if you're bolshy enough you can also snaffle someone else's meal, with no fear of retribution.

We left in complete disgust, and went down to Brunetti's, where we waited five minutes, were treated politely and got a fresh, tasty meal. There's a good reason some places get to be institutions. 1000 Pound Bend doesn't even remotely run the risk of that.

a cool "little" eatery/brunch venue. good coffee and a menu which is cheap and caters for the vegetarian. out the back is a gallery space which they often show artsy type films in.