Mixing It Up

Blending remains taboo in specialty coffee.

Say the word and you can feel the room stiffen—how dare you muddy a prized geisha with something else? For years, we've celebrated purity: single origins, single varietals, singular stories. But as I cup hundreds of coffees each season, I find myself wondering... what if we’ve misunderstood the true potential of the cup? What if we stopped treating coffee like a solo act—and started treating it like a canvas?

We’ve long leaned on processing and fermentation as tools to elevate a pure origin. And that’s brought real value. These techniques have given coffee producers a chance to transform hardship—bad weather, low yields—into something not just saleable, but exceptional. Something they could take pride in. Something people could love. Fermentation has brought biochemists into the fold, sparked curiosity, and shaken specialty out of its standardization slump. It's created excitement.

But lately, walking the booths at festivals or scanning shelves in shops, I can’t help but feel like we’re all doing versions of the same thing. The same names, the same varietals, the same fermented fireworks. Where are we going with all this? What is it, exactly, we’re trying to get good at?

Over time—cupping table after cupping table—my perspective has changed. These aren’t just coffees anymore. They’re ingredients. Tools. Colors of paint. And the question that keeps returning is: what kind of picture might we be able to paint?

At a recent buyer’s event, we tasted nearly 100 coffees in two days. I arrived with a plan, as you must—filling gaps in our catalog, matching flavor profiles. But even with a plan, you can still be caught off guard. I looked down at a beautiful, unique cup and thought: this is special, but who is it for? I liked it—but liking it isn’t enough.

And that’s what keeps pushing me toward something new. Or rather—something old, reimagined. We need to mix things up. Quite literally.

The word “blend” has baggage. It evokes the generic: Morning Blend, Holiday Blend, Breakfast Blend. Even the French word “assemblage” feels mechanical. But that’s not what I’m after. I’m not assembling. I’m composing.

Blending should be an act of art. A concoction with intent. Curated, expressive, layered. An oeuvre.

Because while that wild, spiky coffee might not stand alone—it may be the exact shade we need to make the whole thing sing. Not the melody, but the harmony. It may add brightness, structure, tension. On its own it might feel like a punch in the face—but blended carefully with a clean, sweet washed coffee, it becomes something greater. The sweetness lifts the funk. The funk adds dimension. The cup transforms.

Not to mention: it’s more sustainable. You take a small amount of rare, expensive coffee and stretch it across more batches—giving more people a chance to taste it, and more depth to every cup.

Painting with just one color is not only difficult—it’s limiting. The works we remember don’t use every color. They use the right ones. Carefully chosen tones that create something new when mixed. Not blue. Not green. But a third color born of both. Something you didn’t see coming. Something that stops you mid-sip.

That’s what we’re chasing.

We still need reverence for the work behind every coffee. For the producers who’ve grown and processed these beans with intention. But we also need to evolve. To take that reverence and do something with it. Something new. Something singular.

I believe the future of specialty coffee lies here: not just in the cup, but in the craftsmanship behind the cup. In the skill not just to roast, but to compose. This is not a commodity you can just buy and resell. It must be built. And that may become the defining edge for coffee shops and roasters in the years ahead.

In Paris alone, you can now find specialty coffee in over 450 places. But how many are offering a truly singular experience? How many are painting with their own palette?

My hope is that our savoir-faire and our vision will carry us somewhere new. That we’ll keep returning to the cupping table, searching for those rare colors. That we’ll keep sketching, mixing, and testing—until we’re ready to present our master work.

Because in the end, that’s what we want to offer: not just another cup, but a complete picture.