Famed Kyoto coffee chain % Arabica is coming to Bali next year
Coffee enthusiasts in Bali, get excited – something interesting is coming our way in 2020.
After opening the first of their Singapore outlets earlier this year in June, famed Kyoto coffee-chain % Arabica is branching out to neighboring Indonesia, with plans to open their Ubud outpost on the first quarter of next year.
As announced on their Instagram page yesterday, % Arabica is planning to open a total of four stores in Indonesia, spread out equally between Jakarta and Bali. And, as you might have guessed – it’s already sparked a wave of excitement among caffeine addicts.
The stores in the capital will be located in District 8, a mixed development complex in SCBD, South Jakarta and Central Park mall, West Jakarta. They’ve said one of the locations in Bali will be in Ubud, while the other has yet to be revealed. (We’ve reached out to the coffee brand for more information, and we’ll update this story as soon as we hear from them.)
Here’s a little bit of history: % Arabica is the brainchild of Japan-born Kenneth Shoji, who started his professional coffee journey with a coffee farm in Hawaii. He then worked together with latte art world champion Junichi Yamaguchi to open the shop’s flagship store in Kyoto’s Higashiyama district in 2014.
Since then, % Arabica has become increasingly popular among coffee enthusiasts, and they currently have 45 outlets across 12 countries, including in Kuwait, the Philippines, and China.
The coffee brand, especially their outlets in Japan, has become quite a tourist destination for many people. On their website, the shop looks set to open soon in new locations aside from Indonesia, with Thailand, the United States, and Qatar also appearing on the list.
As we’ve come to learn, % Arabica’s Ubud location has German-born Alexis Dornier as its designer. Dornier, who is now based in Ubud and has increasingly become a household name in design and architecture across Pulau Dewata, has apparently worked with the Kyoto-based coffee chain a few times before.
This includes outlets in China’s Chengdu and Beijing, as well as London Covent Garden in the United Kingdom. If those are anything to go by, which we’re sure they are, Coconuts Bali is excited to see what the space will look like in Ubud.
Hopefully, they will stick to their expected opening plans this time around because let’s face it, we’ve heard about % Arabica coming to Indonesia as early as October 2017 (as teased by this Instagram post). Despite much anticipation, it’s only this week that we were informed of the actual dates.
We’ve certainly seen their eye-catching design for the to-go cups all over Instagram, so now we’re keen to try the coffee ourselves. Is it worth the hype, or is it just extremely Instagrammable? Well, watch this space for our future updates!
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