Coffee making magic
I remember hearing as a child a quote that is most often attributed to Sir Isaac Newton; “what goes up. must come down…” Newton may not have said those very words, but his simple premise should be enough to debunk the black magic involved with this gravity defying coffee maker by Lina Fischer. In clear violation of the laws of gravity, this bean brewer seems to lift the boiling water up into its ceiling and magically dispense hot, life affirming black magic to an awed audiences. The “Kahva” has a clean hour glass silhouette and reminds us that all good things come in time and through dark-arts sorcery…
Designer: Lina Fischer
How to use it:
1. Fill the double-coated glass container with water and put the desired amount of coffee into the upper brewing unit.
2. Bring the water to boil by using the induction powered table station or any other heating device.
3. Watch the hot water flowing upwards into the brewing unit due to the rising air-pressure. Listen to the bubbling noise and smell the aroma of coffee. Let it brew for a few minutes.
4. Switch of the heating device and watch the brewed coffee emerge in the glass container, quickly drawn back through a filter by a vacuum witch has been created by the cooling.
5. Open Kahva by turning the grip and pour some fully aromatic, mocha-style coffee directly into your cup. Enjoy!
If you liked this design, you would also be interested in:
- Muji Non-directional Coffee Maker by Kazushige Miyake
- Saljoe - Rotating Snowflake Coffee Table by Ivan Yahya Adhiteja
- Coffee gets the shaft…
- Sintesi Period Table by Brad Ascalon
- Makkina - Espresso Machine by Soren Henssler
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I think I still prefer Bodums design classic ‘Santos‘ that operates by the same principle. It’s on the market for how many years now, 30, 40? Still shows no signs of aging.
The Santos is beautiful, but uses a gel fuel so is less practical for everyday use. It’s also all glass. The Bodum and Starbucks electric version I’ve owned and it makes great coffee. However, the minimum cups is 2, so if you’re a one cup in the morning person that’s a waste. The Bodum bottom, like I expect the Kahva, is a pain to clean - virtually impossible. If the Kahva makes one cup minimum and the carafe portion is easily cleaned, it will be great, and it takes up way less space than the Bodum.
I didn’t know there were gel fuel and electrical versions available, I only own the stovetop one.
Agreed, a small single-household-morning version would be nice; but for the time-constrained weekday mornings, there’s always my trusty Senseo.
This is how “classic” coffee makers work. The only set apart is that this retro brewer has a modern design update.
i want one, BUt how Much is it? Is it $999.99?
Ironic. Kahva coffee maker doesn’t have a handle.
(Kahva = handle in Finnish)
I’m thinking it would burn your hand to grab the coffee maker like that. I mean, I sure don’t grab a freshly brewed pot of regular coffee by the glass.
Wow, a coffee syphon. Antiquemodo!
Good ones make great coffee.. this one has to be inferior, the coffee is touching metal. Get a nice Hario or bodum santos or Cona or something, with a glass rod filter so it’s just glass, water, and coffee.
Great coffee, comparable in quality to a good french press (but very different in texture and flavor!), and they’ve been used for a very, very, very long time. Plus they’re geeky cool like a science experiment.
Lots available on SweetMarias, which pretty much any coffee geek knows about: [www.sweetmarias.com]
My favorite is the Hario Nouveau, but you can’t get it anymore, at least not easily:
[coffeegeek.com]
There is absolutely nothing in common between this and an espresso maker though, aside from them both using some sort of coffee and some sort of h2o. The whole point of a vacuum brewer is to have the ideal temperature to make coffee — just below boiling. The bits that do boil push the cooler water up, the bit of remaining water that stays at the bottom boiling never touches the grounds, it just stays there helping agitate them with additional steam (you leave the coffee slurry agitating for a couple of minutes at least, much like with a french press). An espresso maker uses boiling water under high pressure, forcing it through coffee grounds in moments, basically cooking them as it extracts the coffee.
They’re both good drinks, but espresso and coffee aren’t the same thing; neither are espresso makers and coffee makers.
But good post, even if it’s hardly a new tech… even fairly average grade beans (ie, grocery ‘gourmet’ coffee as opposed to Folgers cans) will taste noticably better when prepared properly. Maybe this will get a few more people to ditch the drip.
There is still another Bodum Santos without fuel gel.. with electrical base that is much more eco-friendly and high tech, as long as it also has a digital clock and a timer which can make your coffe automatically everyday for you..
I don’t think the coffee will touch the metal. It looks like it’s double layered in the drawings where the metal outer sleeve is insulating the glass brewing section. And, despite the stupid idea of grabbing a pot of hot coffee by the glass, it looks as if it pours out from under the metal as well, so grabbing there and pouring seems to be proper, just like any double layered insulated metal travel mug.
Great design.
……………………………..um……………………………….
nothing new or innovative here.
just a (dare-i-say?) overly simple aesthetic re styling.
no wow. not a new concept. not a new feature.
why is this featured? yanko design highlights some great designs, but then there are lazy re-thoughts like this. not simple clever, just simple.
is it because most of the population has not seen this style of coffee maker before?
I think yanko tend to have a lot of readers that are from non-design background and as such has not seen these type of coffee makers before.
You don’t need a design background to know about coffee…
stick a handle on the thing and I’d buy one
I agree, it needs a kahva.
no, it doesn’t. According to the technical drawings, it’s insulatet/double-coated.
Been around since 1838.
Not impressed. ?
I think it looks nice, and provided you could actually hold it while hot, then the I really like the simplicity of the design without the handle (I own an electric Santos, and I’m not totally in love with the handle). I do think the one innovative use that it has is that it doesn’t appear that you need to remove the top to pour it, which is an extra, and sometimes messy step with the Santos. I’m not really sure exactly how it works on this design in particular, but in a world of coffee makers that do mostly the same thing, I think that this is enough of a step to warrant some congratulations.
“but in a world of coffee makers that do mostly the same thing, I think that this is enough of a step to warrant some congratulations.”
They all make coffee.
This one makes coffee the SAME EXACT WAY.
There is no need for congratulations when nothing is changed. This isn’t even really stylized. This is just another cough. If it was extremely bold aesthetics for a kitchen POP, or maybe if it looked suuuper ergonomic, but this is nothing of the sorts. It looks tall and unwieldy. This would be awkward for a woman with small hands to pour.
Four thumbs down for originality and boasting something new from 1838.
Eleven thumbs down for the public not knowing about simple devices.
I’m going to release revolutionary ball valve faucets for the kitchen. The case for the ball bearing will be made of clear plastic, so you can see the ball working inside. People will love it, simply because, they don’t know about it. They’re impressed by the thought of a technology that doesn’t make sense to their minds as of this moment.
To my humble opinion, you are missing the point here, AG. There is real innovation in this design, even if it is based on a long known principle of coffee brewing. (anyway, which other modern coffee brewer is not based on a long known principle? Nespresso? hah). The redisgn provides some substantial enhancements for the handling, like matt mentionned above (did you ever use one of these conventional vacuum pots by yourself? They are unhandy and one always has to live in fear about breaking the glass top). Moreover, the aesthetic qualities are quite convincing.
Does a designer have to reinvent the whole wheel everytimes he designs a bycicle?
I am pretty sure Yanko was mocking the “magical” properties of this coffee maker and just having fun with old tech.
Indeed kahva is making coffee the same way as old school vac pots, but that’s not the point here. I don’t think the designer would claim to be the inventor of the very principle of the vac pot . The clever rearrangement of the components, however, brings –as a matter of fact– substantial innovation which indeed warrant some congrats. The very fact of the possibility to pour the coffee whitout the need of removing the upper part is a big plus compared to the somewhat unhandy old school vac pots. With double-coated glass, the handle-less solution might work (the production of such a glass container must be quite expensive though).
In the age of sterile (and boring) Nespresso-Caps this design is a convincing attempt to emphasize the “physical”( and sensual aspects of coffee brewing.
I’m sorry, isn’t this the EVA SOLO? is she the same designer or is this a painful blatant knock off?
Formally there are some parallels with the eva solo. Both have a carafe-like shape. But for the rest, these two designs have nothing in common. The methodolgy of coffee brewing is totally different. With its vacuum principle, kahva seems to produce a far better coffee than the beautiful and award winning eva solo (eva solo’s breew is, by the way, awful due to the fact that the joe is never separated from the grounds). Not to speak of the renewed experience of coffee brewing, this design provides. It must be magnificent, to watch the clear water disappear and reappear transformed to the dark brew (in this respect there is also a formal difference to most of the vacuum brewers, that are totally glassy and show the whole process. Hiding the brewing process in the upper part underlines this aspect of transformation in a charming way).
There is no reason call this design a knock-off.