Lavazza: YES! We’re OPEN

With every cup of coffee, comes a different story. This is what Italian coffee house Lavazza believes in. “From the very beginning, we’ve been inspired by coffee and how it can connect people,” explains Francesca Lavazza, “In Italy, cafes are considered as a kind of second home.” Founded in 1895 and now one of the world’s leading coffee manufacturers, Lavazza is celebrating the experience of coffee culture through its annual photography calendars. Its most recent 2023 Calendar has been made in collaboration with renowned photographer and filmmaker Alex Prager, whose photographs are an allusive blend of classic Hollywood cinema and hyperrealism photography, with notes of popular culture. 

The result? A composition bursting with colour, where truth and reality become blurred almost like a fabricated memory or dream. The images are unpredictably vibrant like the lives of the characters she chooses to photograph. How these lives intersect, however, is through coffee. 

Last month, SLEEK was invited, among a number of other guests, to get to know the latest Calendar in Hamburg. Like a cafe, the event was a rendezvous of sorts for creatives to get together and connect over the art of coffee and photography. Susanne Wege, Managing Director of Luigi Lavazza Germany and Lavazza Coffee Austria, led the evening with a vibrant programme. 

While at the event, SLEEK spoke to Francesca Lavazza, Member of the Board of Directors at Lavazza, about post-pandemic café culture, art for sustainability and Lavazza’s 2023 Calendar in collaboration with photographer Alex Prager. 

SLEEK: The new calendar titled “YES! we’re OPEN“ focuses on the cafè/bar culture, a place where identities meet and embrace their differences. What does the café culture mean to you? How did the pandemic change this?

Francesca Lavazza: Cafe and coffee culture for me is very personal. It comes from a familial place, with Lavazza being founded in 1895 and being passed on for generations. From the very beginning, we’ve been inspired by coffee and how it can connect people. In Italy, cafés are considered a kind of second home. 

During the pandemic, one thing that impacted everybody collectively was our inability to go out. We were not able to go to our favourite bar, to drink coffee and to relax. But in a way, the pandemic gave us all an opportunity to start again. Lavazza created a very important project that supported bars across Italy to be able to reopen again. We’ve worked closely with the communities around us to provide people once again with a cafe not only open for hospitality but also open to restart, to reshape and redesign a world better than before. 

S: How was the pandemic’s influence on art and culture reflected in the Lavazza Calendar?

FL: For us, the cafe is a kind of ideas space of harmony and humanity, humanity being the most urgent focus in fact. Since the pandemic, we have been developing the idea of The New Humanity through our calendars, which focuses on a collective reflection and revision of a framework for environmentalism. We’re pushing for a more open, more inclusive, more sensitive humanity. 

S: Lavazza has always stated sustainability as a priority with past Calendars like The Earth Defenders By Steve McCurry which focused on local coffee-growing communities in Africa. In which way does the current Calendar reflect the message of sustainability?

FL: The work with Steve McCurry started in 2002, and was completely dedicated to the coffee-growing community which was really important to us. Through our photography Calendars, made with photographers who are equally as passionate about sustainability, we wanted to promote a positive perspective in a way that supports local communities and farmers. Over the past years, Lavazza has supported many projects to support local communities and farmers, such as Save The Children, the UN and Slow Food. 

S: Why is art a useful medium to carry the message of sustainability to the viewer?

FL: Art is a powerful tool, and it can manifest itself in many ways. In the example of the calendar, it’s photography while another project TOward2030 uses street art to promote change. This was an urban art project that tackled the issue of sustainability by transforming the entire city, from the centre to the suburbs, to shed light on the United Nations’ 17 + 1 Goals.  Working with eighteen street-artists, we were able to reach hidden places to create a moment for people to connect with issues of sustainability. 

S: Over the past years, Lavazza has supported many projects to support local communities and farmers. In which way are you sending out the message as a brand in an authentic way?

FL: We are promoting collaboration in our continuous partnerships with Slow Food and the UN. Coffee is a raw material, and so we need to work together within and beyond the community to ensure that the extraction of coffee is executed in a sustainable way while still offering opportunities for local communities. We’re also very transparent about our methods and approach, exampled by our book YES! we’re OPEN designed by Fabio Novembre. This book includes the social activities Lavazza has been involved in since 2004. It also includes interviews that touch on themes dear to Lavazza: the concept of being open, sustainability and safeguarding the planet, the idea of travel and its significance and, of course, professional and personal reflections on the experience of the Calendar.