% Arabica to make UK debut with double store openings in London

Lifestyle-orientated Japanese coffee brand % Arabica is to make its UK debut with two London outposts officially opening on 1 November 2019.

The brand will open its flagship store in Broadway Market, East London, and Covent Garden will see its sister site situated on King Street, the latter of which is currently in its soft launch phase.

% Arabica was founded by Kenneth Shoji, who said he became “enthralled” with the emerging coffee culture whilst studying at UCLA in the early 1990s. Shoji progressed to training as a barista before taking it one step further and buying a coffee farm in Hawaii.

He said his passion led him to launch a green bean trading company and become a distributor for the technologically advanced Slayer espresso machines, Marco Uber Boiler, and Chemex in Asian markets.

% Arabica said: “To this day, Kenneth remains the creative mastermind and personally selects all of the locations, designs the stores with his preferred partners and visits coffee origins to select all of the coffee beans.

“Through an exclusive partnership with Latorre & Dutch, they are planning to set up washing stations in coffee origins such as Ethiopia, Uganda, Colombia, and Indonesia.”