Studio Notes

From early adopter to keynote speaker to Pro Partner—our journey with WooCommerce spans the platform's entire history. After 14 years of crafting e-commerce experiences for coffee roasters, specialty food brands, and mission-driven companies, we've achieved WooCommerce's highest recognition. Here's how we got here and where we're headed next.

Rebuilding our 15-year-old coffee tasting app revealed how dramatically home brewing culture had evolved while we were designing for coffee businesses, teaching us valuable lessons in the process.

Still buzzing from the Specialty Coffee Association Expo in Houston—revealing Swiss Water’s vibrant new look, seeing our Sum>One packaging shine, reconnecting with coffee friends, and closing things out at La Marzocco’s unforgettable party.

This week, we had the privilege of experiencing an unforgettable night of stories, laughter, and connection at The Moth, hosted by the incredible team at Literary Arts. It was an evening that celebrated the power of storytelling and its unique ability to bring us closer together through shared human experiences.

We have the great honor of supporting this incredible group of writers, filmmakers, artists, and storytellers here in Portland.

Love a good Old Fashioned but taking January off the sauce? Ray's personal favorite replacement combines aromatic bitters, orange peels, sugar cubes, and soda water to create a sophisticated non-alcoholic drink that looks and tastes official. Complete with equipment recommendations, ingredient tips, and clever hacks for the perfect mocktail experience.

In early 2001, our Creative Director was slinging shots and taking photos at the newly-opened Stumptown Belmont location. Your’e going to recognize some of these lovely mugs. Happy National Coffee Day, buddies.

As we celebrated our 15th anniversary, we decided it was time to create a space that would embody our aesthetic, celebrate our clients, and be a delight to spend time in day after day. After renovating a rough-but-promising space we'd been using on and off for a decade, we now have a minimal, modern studio plus an artist's room oasis. The result? Pure delight.

Sometimes you outgrow your own design decisions. Heading into Unpacking Coffee's Season 4, we realized we'd been avoiding our own chosen typeface (Galaxie Polaris) in favor of geometric fonts. The solution? Cosmica, a geometric sans from the same foundry that maintains our design skeleton while giving us the character we'd been seeking all along.

We've done it again, folks. Introducing The Double Shot, a new podcast where Raymond and I talk business, design, coffee, technology, and whatever else occurs to us as we trip through this beautiful world. From reluctant keynoting to maker vs. manager schedules, our first four episodes explore the intersection of creativity and business."

When asked about design inspiration, our answers surprised us: museums, long hikes, camping, boredom, wandering minds. These all require something precious—time. So we tried Summer Fridays, leaving at noon each Friday in July and August. The experiment taught us key lessons: owners must fully buy in, you can't cram 8 hours into 4, and always communicate schedule changes to clients.

Fifteen episodes into Unpacking Coffee Season Two, we've challenged ourselves with custom opening songs for each roaster, a new website, and exciting collaborations. We're covering La Marzocco Café's roasters in residence, deepening our partnership with Roast Magazine, and sourcing diverse roasters from fully Colombian Devoción to 100% direct trade Forty Weight. Plus, bonus interview extras because our chats are too good to waste.