This year, De’Longhi heads to Milan Design Week with its latest conceptual project, The World’s Smallest Coffee Shop. Crafted in collaboration with Simon Weisse Studio, it comprises not just one café, but five miniature works that interpret landmark coffee shop institutions in Paris, Tokyo, Milan, Copenhagen and Berlin.
With the model facades designed around De’Longhi’s fully automatic coffee machines, the series comes together to signify how coffee shop-standard brews can be replicated at home. The Rivelia bean-to-cup model leads the line-up of its assortment machines with its bean hoppers that make it easy to switch between different brands and roast types in true barista style.
As well as setting out to prove that its users can recreate coffee shop drinks, the collaboration brings a unique fusion of cinematic model-making and architectural design. Having famously built models for Wes Anderson’s films, Simon Weisse and his makers put their expertise in designing atmospheric sets into crafting several finely detailed elements, including minuscule cups, bistro curtains and more functional components like a window which can be opened to access the machine’s operating screen.
In an official statement, Weisse reflected on the design process, saying, “In my work for the screen, miniatures are used to create a sense of wonder and precision that feels more real than computer-generated imagery. The decision to work with De’Longhi was based on the fact that they treat the process of making coffee with that same level of obsessive detail.”
“By building these tiny shops, we aimed to prove that a machine is the source of the coffee itself. The goal was to show that the standard of coffee produced by these machines is just as high as what you would find in the architecture of a historic Parisian café,” he added.
Take a closer look at The World’s Smallest Coffee Shop series in the gallery above.
Be sure to visit De’Longhi’s Milan Design Week showcase from April 21-25 in the Brera District.
