African Design Magazine December 2016 | Page 45

African project Coco Safar – South Africa ches in Cape Town r combines the finest Michelin-star quality patisserie, baked goods and a café uxurious retro chic setting. W ith the global launch of this groundbreaking brand in 2016, Coco Safar has opened the first retail store and café (of many more to follow worldwide), in Cavendish Square, Cape Town. Coco Safar is the culmination of a lifetime of journeys and discoveries in the café, coffee, patisserie industries for the entrepreneurial visionaries behind this highly innovative, multisensory consumer experience. Both creative and entrepreneurial at heart, Wilhelm Liebenberg and Caroline Sirois’ epicurean passion for a unique café experience that combines equally great food and coffee, saw them opening a string of cafés in Montreal, Toronto and New York as part of an insightful street level R&D process to shape and refine the business model and brand identity. “It has always been about excellence, authenticity and relevance”, says co-founder Liebenberg, “and the drive to be unique. If you’re not relevant and you can’t bring a distinctly new consumer experience and product offering, you have no need to exist.” Yet, it wasn’t quite that simple... the brand took over 10 years of africandesignmagazine.com 45