Where Did Blue Bottle Coffee Open Its Eighth China Store?

On March 21, Blue Bottle Coffee announced its eighth official store in mainland China, located at Phase II of Columbia Circle in Shanghai, with doors opening on March 30 and gift-giving activities during the launch. The new store was designed with Neri&Hu Design and Research Office around a theme of time and community imprints.

The layout includes a central island bar, recycled clay brick flooring, and eco-friendly seating, with large floor-to-ceiling windows bringing in natural light. Single-origin anaerobic robusta coffee beans and merchandise sit on one side of the counter. Images from the first day showed no long queues, and a Shenzhen store remains unconfirmed.

On March 21, Blue Bottle Coffee officially announced that its eighth official store in mainland China would be located at Phase II of Columbia Circle in Shanghai, opening its doors on March 30, with gift-giving activities arranged during the opening period. The new store continues its collaboration with Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, adopting the design theme of "chiseling through the texture of time, depicting community imprints," incorporating elements such as a central island bar, recycled clay brick flooring, and eco-friendly seating within a limited area. Notably, judging from photos taken on the first day of the visit, this store did not recreate the long-queue spectacles of the past, with popularity having declined somewhat compared to before. Meanwhile, regarding the location of the first permanent store outside Shanghai, rumors on social platforms suggest that the MixC World commercial district in Shenzhen is expected to welcome the first South China store later this year, but the official side has not yet formally confirmed it.

▲

Click to follow | Daily specialty coffee culture magazine Coffee Workshop

On March 21, Blue Bottle Coffee announced through its official account that the brand has welcomed its eighth official store in mainland China, located at Phase II of Columbia Circle in Shanghai, with gift-giving activities launching on the opening day of March 30.

According to the information provided by the official side, this new store's operating area is not particularly large, and the spatial design continues to be jointly created by Blue Bottle and Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, developed around the theme of "chiseling through the texture of time, depicting community imprints."

Stepping inside, an island-style bar is arranged at the center of the open area, with a white double-sloped triangular canopy covering the top of the island bar, its surface featuring a soft corrugated texture, giving seated customers the feeling of being under the eaves.

Large floor-to-ceiling windows on all four sides of the space bring in natural light, complementing the interior ambient lighting. The spacious island counter provides visitors with a more open view, with various Blue Bottle coffee beans and merchandise neatly arranged on one side of the island counter, including the single-origin anaerobic robusta coffee beans that were recently launched. The other side of the island counter is deliberately kept "blank," with an adjacent shared area on both sides designated for customers to sit and enjoy.

The bar area responsible for brewing coffee also adopts a light-colored concrete style, with the wall behind it shaped into the character "家" (home), and the brand's iconic wooden menu hanging on the left side. In the center of the wall, the brand logo is pieced together with blue bricks, visually creating an effect of "the wall having been chiseled open."

Beyond the spatial layout, this new Blue Bottle store also emphasizes the concepts of environmental protection and sustainability. The flooring and central island counter in the store are both laid with recycled clay bricks, each brick surface covered with a thin coating, and after jointing techniques and jointless treatment, they exude a texture where old and new interweave. Additionally, the seating in the store is also made from recycled materials.

It is worth mentioning that, judging from on-site photos taken by the first batch of visitors, the Blue Bottle Columbia Circle store did not, on its opening day, draw the queuing scenes that used to spark discussion every time in the past; at certain times there were even quite a few empty seats in the store, and its popularity was indeed not what it used to be.

As for the question that many fans care about more—"When exactly will Blue Bottle Coffee open outside Shanghai?"—following earlier pop-up events held successively in Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Beijing, and other places, the official side has still not given a clear statement to date, and which city outside Shanghai will host a permanent store and when it will open have both yet to be finalized.

However, recently on social plat forms there have been reports that Blue Bottle Coffee's first store outside Shanghai is expected to make its debut in Shenzhen later this year, with site selection work in other key cities also steadily advancing. Some netizens have also posted that South China's first Blue Bottle Coffee will be located in the MixC World commercial district in Shenzhen; as for what style it will specifically present, we may as well wait and see.

For Blue Bottle Coffee, which takes the specialty route and insists on "one store, one design," maintaining the brand's unique design style, combined with the high investment cost per store, means the pace of store expansion is destined not to be too fast. Moreover, expanding too quickly often brings more pressure in terms of operations and quality, so Blue Bottle Coffee hopes to exercise good control and grasp the rhythm, acting relatively prudently.

Image source: Blue Bottle Coffee

Disclaimer: Some images in this article are sourced from the internet; for some content on the website such as images, we will respect the original authors' copyright and indicate the source, but due to the large quantity, there may be individual images or texts that have not yet been credited in time; please forgive us. If the original author has any disputes, they may contact the website for handling; once verified, we will immediately correct it. Compiled and edited by "Coffee Workshop"; please indicate the source when reprinting. If there is any infringement, please inform us for deletion. Thank you~!

The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.