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pretty crazy, like we were nuts to try this," he says over dinner with Lizz and me in Florence one night. He reached across the table and took Lizz's hand, genuine affection in his eyes. "This thing, Out of the Box, it works because people like Lizz believe in it." That might be an understatement. Of course, La Marzocco has always been of the belief that you work for the baristas, the people using your equipment. You listen to them, and you ask them questions when you're designing a machine. In 2009, Chris had a hunch that baristas would rather attend a funky gathering—essentially a Big Gulp–sized barista jam—than be stuck in a stuffy convention center. He was so right that OOTB started to grow almost immediately. In the past four years, OOTBs have been held around the world in diverse coffee communities—Stockholm, Sweden; Athens, Greece; Berkeley, Calif. They have the same footprint—two days of workshops with experts, evening parties, and all the hands-on equipment time a barista could ask for. The one held in Milan every two years, however, remains the biggest, the most intense and colorful, and the most inspiring. This, then, was the third Out of the Box Milano, and, true to form, Chris reinvented it again. A few hours after landing at Linate Airport, I strolled through the streets of the city's pulsating design district, stopping every few steps to peer through the windows of salons, boutiques, galleries, and cafés. I knew I was close when I spied my friends Stefanos Domatiotis of Taf in Greece and Thomas Schweiger of Green & Bean in Germany, chatting outside the event space. It would be like this for the next two days: You'd be making espresso, trying out the Linea PB for the first time maybe, and ,ÊÓä£Î OCTOB ER + Ê "6 ÊUÊ6"1 ÊÉ- someone would ask you a question that spun into a deeper discussion, and suddenly it would be two hours later. Forums for thinking, for being about coffee like this are hard to find; they're nontraditional. I think they're the wave of our industry's future. The overall theme for the event was innovation, and did it ever hit the mark. Chris brought together artists and writers, musicians and cyclists, architects and designers. He asked them to look at La Marzocco from outside of, well, in the box, I suppose. His intent was to gather people who aren't coffee professionals, but who are creative thinkers and doers, and have them share their perspective of our coffee culture with us. It was pretty remarkable. Our surroundings alone were inspiring. We were at Galvanotecnica Bugatti in Zona Tortona, a breathtaking city villa. Surrounding a sunny, relaxing courtyard, three two-story-tall buildings hosted our classes and meals. They were divided into mini art galleries where, for example, the True Artisan Café operated: twenty-four guest roasters were featured on four machines with top international baristas making coffee all day long. A bright corner was dedicated to Flip that Bar, the name of an exhibit designed by students from the European Institute of Design who interpreted the café experience through a short film and a book created just for OOTB. Works by celebrated German graphic designer and photographer Sven Hoffmann hung next to pieces curated from the London and Milan Coffee Art Project in the Allegra Gallery, which also included paintings, fashion designs, and etchings by emerging artists, which were auctioned off for charity on the final night of the event. More than 5,000 EUR were raised for a well-water project in Africa. Attendees cruised the Modbar, an under-the-counter, modular -1 Ê{ , Ê³Ê 1,9 ÊÓä£{ ÊUÊ6" 1 Ê É--1 Êx BEST BAR TO REPORTS FROM OLSTIROASTER NDA DRINKS THE MUL GROWS UP BRAZIL & RWA A AT SIGNATURECHAN CONCEPT N THE IN T CAFÉ GING WITH CLIMATE CH ANGE REPORTS FR INDONESIA OM & ITALY COFFEE TV AT PUERTO RIC A AN FARM SUBSCRIBE TODAY! DON't MISS AN ISSUE! www.baristamagazine.com www.baristamagazine.com 47