Lindt approached us at a moment when they were ready to explore something entirely new. Their Australian subsidiary had imagined a place where people could linger over chocolate rather than simply purchase it – a café that would deepen the sensory experience and offer a home for specialist products. It was an idea without precedent in the company’s long Swiss history.
Head office in Zurich watched cautiously from afar. Australia, they reasoned, was a safe place to experiment; if the concept faltered, the world would barely notice. But the opposite happened. The first cafés flourished, and soon the global CEO instructed every Lindt subsidiary to pursue similar ventures. What began as a local experiment became a worldwide shift, and we found ourselves designing Lindt cafés not only across Australia but also in Tokyo and Zurich.
From the outset, we wanted these spaces to feel welcoming and refined – a contemporary echo of the European Kaffeehaus, translated into a modern retail environment. Materials were chosen for their warmth and tactility, and for their ability to evoke chocolate without resorting to cliché. The palette of browns, whites and golds emerged naturally from this exploration, a gentle but deliberate departure from Lindt’s familiar blue. Over time, this Australian palette began to influence the global Lindt identity, subtly reshaping how the brand presents itself around the world.
Each café brought its own character and constraints. Some were tucked deep within shopping centres, others opened directly to the street. The concept evolved with every iteration, maintaining a clear family resemblance while allowing each store to express its own personality.
The Martin Place café in Sydney was the first in the world, and it remains the flagship. When the time came to refurbish it, we approached the task with a sense of responsibility – to honour the heritage setting, to open the space to more light, and to create a more generous retail presence. The renewed café, completed in early 2013, feels brighter, more confident, and more attuned to its historic surroundings.
In Melbourne, the Chapel Street café presented a different challenge. Most of the tenancy sat deep within the site and well below street level. To draw people in, we designed the façade to be as open and transparent as possible. Through the expansive glazing, the signature Lindt elements – and the chocolate itself – become part of the streetscape, catching the eye of passers‑by. A single entry door, despite the long frontage, allowed the display to take centre stage.
The story continues. New cafés and shops are being planned across Australia, each one adding another chapter to a concept that began as a quiet experiment and has since become part of Lindt’s global identity.