Archives: Projects
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Designing Coffee: New Coffee Places and Branding, gestalten
Designing Coffee explores what it takes to curate some of the most innovative and eclectic coffee shops of today, from brand identity and packaging, through to interior design and architecture.
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The Anthropology of Coffee, Portland State University
After almost a decade of research and travel in the field, I put together a unit on the Anthropology of Coffee, covering coffee cultures and traditions around the world throughout history. This interactive course offered a more in-depth look at research completed for my book Spill the Beans: Global Coffee Culture. The inaugural offering of…
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6 Agritourism Destinations for your next Sustainable Getaway
Fancy a fresh experience that’s authentic and brings you closer to nature? An agritourism holiday may be just what you need. What is agrotourism, you ask? The term essentially means to visit working farms or agricultural operations for enjoyment, education or active involvement. It’s also referred to as agriturismo, a mesh of the Italian words…
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Rebrand Copy, Cookaborough
Cookaborough is a platform for cooks and chefs that allows them to sell ready meals direct-to-consumer. Their end-to-end software is perfect for restaurants, food stores, home cooks, and more. We assisted with the copy for their new website, articles, onboarding documents, and brand materials, helping them re-shape their copy to target a wider audience.
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Spill the Beans: Global Coffee Culture, gestalten
Coffee is the world’s cup. Over 2.25 billion are brewed, sipped, and savored daily. A loyal companion and energetic facilitator of every day, coffee has sprouted an entire cafe culture and a booming industry. While the caffeine fix is hard to ignore, this beloved hot drink holds a rich and diverse history that sinks deeper…
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The City of Chai Tin, Prana Chai
We designed and illustrated a ‘City of Chai’, using Melbourne landmarks alongside Prana Chai products to showcase the interconnectedness of the brand to its home city. Prana Chai started in Melbourne over a decade ago and quickly gained cult status with their honey-covered chai blend – perfect for coffee shops to steam into milk. Their…
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Coffee Fest Education & Conference Programming
Coffee Fest takes place 4 times per year in different cities across America. To date, I have directed educational programming for 8 x shows in New York, Chicago, Louisville, Los Angeles, Seattle, Anaheim, and Orlando. Contracted beginning January 2022 to help with a strategic overhaul of content, conference, and education for the nation’s leading specialty…
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Melbourne Cafe Reusable Cup, Prana Chai
For client Prana Chai, Lani worked with her team at Four Seasons of Food to conceptualize, plan, design, and project manage the manufacture of a thermal walled ‘camp cup’ style to-go mug with a custom illustration.
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Small Business Owner Feature Series, CandyBar
For client ReferralCandy/CandyBar, I interviewed and wrote articles on successful small business owners around the world. These were published in their newsletters and blogs as the keystone content for their marketing strategy.
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THEMATIKOS x Prana Chai Candle
As a limited edition product for Prana Chai’s 2020 Christmas Campaign, Lani project managed, photographed, and marketed this collaboration between Melbourne-based Prana Chai and handmade candle company THEMATIKOS. Chai for all your senses.
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Bean Equality: Narrowing the Gender Gap in Coffee Production, GFJ Stories
It’s not a great time to be a coffee farmer. There’s enough turbulence generated by volatile coffee prices, an increase in pestilence and disease, climate change, supply surplus, troubling economic and political turmoil and the resulting lack of workers – without even beginning to consider equality issues. As one of the world’s most valuable traded…
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Market Tote, Prana Chai
This tote was designed for Australian client Prana Chai. We conceptualized, sourced the supplier, designed the product, and managed manufacture – the client outsourced the entire project and simply received the product delivered to their offices. We also completed photography and launched this product in their e-comm store along with related marketing and inclusion of…
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‘The Fantastic Four’ Product Launch, Prana Chai
We proposed the concept of a ‘Four Flavour Giftset’ that showcased Prana Chai’s variety of tea blends in smaller, trial sizes – then built a fully-fledged product launch, press, and marketing campaign to release these to markets in Australia, Europe, the UK, and Japan.
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Product Catalog, Giorgio’s Gourmet
Lani developed hundreds of well-researched and chef-directed product descriptions for the product catalog of North American luxury food importer, Giorgio’s Gourmet, across a wide range of product categories. Descriptions were developed for products like handmade pasta, truffles, cured meats, jams, jellies, sauces, and herbs.
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Choosing a Prosciutto: San Daniele vs. Di Parma
Know your prosciuttos from your jamóns? How about your Prosciutto San Daniele from your Prosciutto Di Parma? In some parts of Europe, cured meats, cheeses and other products are simply named after the town or region they were initially produced in. This can make it close to impossible for those looking for a tasty addition…
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All About Parmigiano Reggiano
Known as the ‘king of the cheeses’, Parmigiano Reggiano has been produced exclusively in the provinces of Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena and parts of the provinces of Mantua and Bologna for over 9 centuries! Producers can be found in the plains, hills and mountains enclosed between the Po and the Rhine rivers. It is here…
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Jamon Iberico Bellota: the gastronomic pride of Spain
Jamon is the cultural and gastronomic pride of Spain. Styles differ in each region, both in Spain and in Portugal, but wherever they are produced the traditions and the artisanal techniques are cultural treasures.
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Coffee Bird at Cafe Show, Seoul
During Coffee Bird’s tour of Asia in 2019, I accompanied and supported the founder during her visit to Asia’s largest coffee event, Cafe Show. During the event, I assisted with cuppings of Coffee Bird’s latest harvest coffee at Namusairo’s booth, and with off-site cuppings at Fritz Coffee Roasters.
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Coffee Bird Farmer Talks & Cuppings, Singapore
In November 2019, Coffee Bird’s founder got real with us about the future of specialty coffee. Many people from across the Southeast Asian coffee community joined the conversation, supporting Coffee Bird’s movement to change the way coffee is traded for good! I helped Coffee Bird’s founder organize farmer talks, cuppings, and tour across Singapore, with…
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Singapore Coffee
On contract for Singaporean F&B investment company, Group MMM, Lani led coffee and bean-to-bar chocolate concept and project development, spearheaded a coffee program for Raffles Hotel in collaboration with their Head Chef, collaborated with a Singapore-based coffee roasting company to develop a new, innovative coffee blend of local coffee (kopi) and worked directly with the…
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Chefs Taste Test Food Deliveries, Unilever Food Solutions
A collaboration between GrabFood and Unilever Food Solutions, I developed the concept, directed, and project-managed a short video and content series where Singaporean Chefs taste-tested their own and others’ food after it had completed the food delivery process – with the intent to help other food operators when packaging.
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The Science of Tea Pairing, Lipton Tea
As writer and project manager for Unilever Food Solutions pilot content marketing project in SE Asia, I wrote, conceptualized, edited and oversaw a team of animators, designers, photographers and film crews to create an array of content like this video targeting F&B operators, sharing some of the science behind pairing tea.
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Truffles, the Diamonds of Gastronomy
Truffles belong in the same biological kingdom as mushrooms. Unlike plants, creatures in the fungi kingdom cannot harvest energy from the sun through photosynthesis. Instead, they thrive through symbiosis, growing with trees – quite often oaks, hazels, or lindens. The relationship works due to the truffles ability to gather minerals from the soil, sharing them…
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Prepare Your Menu for Food Delivery, Unilever x GrabFood Singapore
This content series was a partnership between GrabFood (South East Asia’s leading food delivery and rideshare platform) and Unilever Food Solutions. For this series, Lani put together advisory articles for food and beverage operators who were considering, or who had decided to, start offering their menu for delivery.
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Premium Kopi Blend, Singapore Coffee
An iconic Singaporean beverage, elevated. Roasted with sugar, Singapore Coffee’s Signature Blend of Arabica & Robusta Coffee combines harmoniously for a smooth and flavourful Kopi-O.
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The Foodism Guide to Specialty Coffee
“For when your local hipster cafe’s coffee menu seems like it’s written in code, look no further than the Foodism guide to coffee in the capital. From lattes to flat whites and cold brew, here’s the lowdown on what to drink and where to drink it.”
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The Club’s Guide to Global Coffee Rituals, British Airways
“While a morning caffeine fix is a common practice almost everywhere, the cultural significance of drinking a cup of coffee – and its preparation – can vary wildly from country to country. Coffee expert and author Lani Kingston spills the beans on the etiquette of coffee consumption around the world, from espresso-mad Italy to the…
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Every Day They Wake Up and Smell the Coffee, The i Newspaper
“Behind the scenes at Kew Gardens in Surrey, 500 scientists work to preserve the biodiversity of our planet. A handful of these make up the ‘coffee team’, striving to preserve and develop the plant to ensure our continued enjoyment for centuries to come.”
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London Coffee, Hoxton Mini Press
Hardcover book published by renowned boutique London publisher Hoxton Mini Press, telling the stories of the people, places, and history that make up London’s world-renowned coffee scene. Photography by David Post.
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MAST Chocolate, London
Mast Brothers Chocolate Makers is a New York-founded bean-to-bar chocolate company at the forefront of craft chocolate. As the London-based senior manager, I helped set up and subsequently ran the company within the UK and EU.
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Rite Moves, Caffeine Magazine
The traditional coffee ceremony is an integral part of Ethiopian and Eritrean culture. This article for the UK’s leading specialty coffee magazine describes both the experience and tradition behind this coffee culture.
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A Day in the Life at MAST Chocolate, Root + Bone: The Offcuts of Food Culture
Join Lani Kingston #BehindThePass for a day in the life of a bean-to-bar chocolate maker at East London’s MAST Chocolate for an independent print publication focusing on the grit of London’s food industry, Root + Bone.
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Town Hall Hotel x MAST Chocolate Christmas
Together with my team at MAST Brothers London, we designed a 1 month Christmas pop-up event held at Town Hall Hotel, with a custom collaboration chocolate bar (Star Anise and Vanilla), a chocolate box Christmas Tree dressed by London florists Grace & Thorn, and a pop-up retail store inside the hotel. We also collaborated on…
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Taste of London Chocolate Workshop
For the 2016 edition of the Taste of London food festival held in Hyde Park, London, the festival organizers built a small pagoda for small groups to have more in-depth experiences during their visit. Inside this pagoda, I held small interactive chocolate truffle-making workshops and bean-to-bar educational seminars that explained the process of chocolate making…
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Neals Yard Dairy x MAST Chocolate and Cheese Pairing Event, London
In January 2016, I collaborated with Neals Yard Dairy to hold an educational seminar/chocolate and cheese pairing event in their Covent Garden headquarters. We paired a selection of 7 chocolates and cheeses and alongside guiding attendees through tasting processes for both products, delivered an educational seminar on each of the products tasted.
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How To Make Coffee: The Science Behind the Bean, Abrams Books, 2015
Highly regarded, best-selling book on the science and history of coffee. Over 250k+ copies printed in nine languages, twelve editions, eight countries: sold globally. Published by Quarto UK, Abrams USA, Max Ström Sweden, LIKE Finland, and many more.
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Is it possible to make the perfect cup of coffee at home? The Telegraph
From roasting to grinding, this article in The Telegraph (UK) from 2015 helps you discover how to make your coffee at home taste as good as a barista’s. Adapted from Lani Kingston’s book, How to Make Coffee: The Science Behind the Bean.
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The Sweet Side: A Pastrychef’s Guide to New York, Taste & Travel
New York is a sugar lover’s paradise – every taste is catered for in the Big Apple. Join pastry chef and food writer Lani Kingston as she tours the city that never sleeps and seeks out the best sugary delights sure to appeal to every culinary-minded visitor.
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A Beer Oasis in the Arizona Desert, Taste & Travel
In the Arizona desert, there’s a revolution brewing. It isn’t a mirage – Phoenix has become a hotspot for craft beer. With ten new breweries opening in Arizona over the last year alone; bars serving rare, local and international brews; and the emergence of experimental and unique beers, Phoenix’s craft brewery scene is booming.
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Real Food, Real People: Madison, Wisconsin, Taste & Travel
The up-and-coming ‘it’ spot on the farm-to-table dining radar isn’t where you would expect. The residents of humble Madison, Wisconsin, are passionate and knowledgeable about food – but don’t feel the need to shout about it from their rooftop. It’s just the way they have always done things here – and why not when your…
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There’s a Hippopotamus on the Roof Eating Cake
In collaboration with the creators of the arena spectacular Walking With Dinosaurs, Pocket Bonfire joins forces with The Creature Technology Company to produce a beguiling adaptation of the Penguin Books 1980’s classic storybook, There’s a Hippopotamus on our Roof Eating Cake.
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Morning Star
This award-winning short film was set in the early 1900’s, in an ominous, rural town, young widow Ida Edminson finds her faith restored when a mysterious stranger, with wings resembling those of an angel, wanders into the small town from an uncharted dirt road. With his presence comes hope for change and resurgence, which Ida…