One of the coolest and most illuminating experiences in coffee is to taste multiple expressions of the same coffee—or as close to it as possible—side by side. (Cool in a deeply nerdy sort of way, but that maybe the only avenue for something to be cool anyway.) That’s what makes cuppings so interesting. Even production cuppings, where slight changes from batch to batch can be detected.
And there’s a new collaborative project that takes this idea to new heights. It’s called Project III and it brings together three renowned roasters from three different countries, each offering their own take on a single producer, and it’s on pre-order now.
Announced yesterday, November 4th, Project III is the brainchild of Calgary’s Phil & Sebastian, who have recruited Arkansas’s Onyx Coffee Lab and Denmark’s La Cabra to each select a lot from a specific producer to showcase their approach to roasting. For the inaugural release, the trio have selected to highlight the work of Mauricio Shattah at Finca La Negrita in Tolima, Colombia. All roasted for filter brewing, the coffees they’ve selected are: a honey-processed Red Gesha (La Cabra), an anaerobic honey processed Gesha (Onyx Coffee Lab), and a semi-washed Red Gesha (Phil & Sebastian).
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“We couldn’t imagine a better producer to launch this project with than Mauricio Shattah. He’s an innovator who has redefined coffee processing in Colombia and beyond. His coffees are layered, complex, and a reflection of his groundbreaking work with honey and natural processes,” Phil & Sebastian co-founder Sebastian Sztabzyb states. “Project III is our way of celebrating that shared pursuit. Honoring the producer, the roaster, and the craft that connects them.”
The result, per their website, is a “conversation in coffee that reveals how terroir, process, and roasting converge to create extraordinary diversity from a single origin.” Future iterations will include Phil & Sebastian along with other roaster collaborators and are expected to be released three times annually.
Each Project III box set comes with 80 grams of coffee from each roaster (240g total) and is available for pre-order for $210 CAD ($149 USD) via the Phil & Sebastian website. It is also available for $150 on La Cabra’s US website for those with tariff hesitance.
The pre-order is open now and is expected to sell out in the next week or so. Shipments will start going out on November 26th. For more information, visit Phil & Sebastian’s official website.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
