Meet the Minds Behind Feuerstein Essentials

White Line Hotels collaborator Feuerstein Essentials was born out of a love for nature and family tradition. Founders Madlaina and her cousin Nicola Feuerstein have created a line of naturally based beauty products that restore the mind and body with the healing power of their native Switzerland. Ancestral inspiration comes through in every aspect of the products: from the simple design of the packaging to the use of Swiss certified organic herbs. Feuerstein Essentials is special, not only because they use regional plants and materials, but also because the products are still partially crafted by hand. Packaging can be easily reused or recycled, and it should go without saying that there is no animal testing. To develop the products they’ve combined centuries old knowledge with the newest developments in cosmetic research. Imbued with a deep appreciation of the Swiss landscape and local knowledge, Feuerstein Essentials puts it best when they say “Our best teacher is nature.”

How was the concept for Feuerstein Essentials born?

Madlaina: The tradition of our family, which has been involved with nature for generations, has always been an endless source of inspiration and motivation for Nicola and I. It was our bond to the family history that triggered the idea of combining the knowledge and creativity of our ancestors with present day insight and cosmetics research to develop sensual products.

“Suddenly something within us sings and swings. A wondrous longing for the forest and the mountains, for solitude and peace. ” This is a wonderful quote from your grandfather, Domenic Feuerstein, who was an author and accomplished nature photographer. Can you tell us a bit more about how he inspired Feuerstein Essentials?

Madlaina: Our grandfather understood how to objectively analyze the laws of nature and simultaneously reveal the beauty of its soul in his touching photographs and texts. The rich treasure of his knowledge about nature and its connections began to impress and influence us in our childhood. The magic of his book and photographs was, so to speak, the guideline for the design of Feuerstein Essentials. This magic continues to shape the development of the company today.
Nicola: The journey to our current skin care line was surprising and intense. For example it led us to search for mountain farmers from across Switzerland who could supply us with herbs. Feuerstein Essentials is our passionate message from nature and the mountains to a predominantly urban audience.

What makes Feuerstein Essentials different from other companies?

Madlaina: It combines nature with modernity and science with sensuality and – what is very important to me – poetry and our love of detail.

How have you grown?

Nicola: In the first phase our range was a few toiletries and accessories for the home and soul (such as scented pillows and candles). The response for the care products from the start was great and motivated us to expand our product range to personal care, cleaning and skin care. Our customers are primarily four and five star hotels with spas. The first – which is not quite a surprise – was in Engadine. This was later followed by other hotels in Switzerland, Germany and Austria as well as selected day spas and concept stores.

Do you see the range of products expanding, for example, to include cosmetics?

Nicola: Our focus is on skin care and wellness products. Our accessories series complements our current offer.

Madlaina: We develop our product range gently. Suggestions for new developments
often come from our customers – like our newest bath salts. The new line is created from flowers, including Edelweiss blossoms.

What is your philosophy about beauty?

Madlaina: Nothing is as beautiful as love and everything that is made with love is beautiful.

Why is it important to Feuerstein Essentials to use regional plants and products?

Madlaina: It’s a reflection of the preciousness of our roots in Engadin, which has an abundance of healing plants, scents and inspirations.

Nicola: We pass this abundance on to our customers. The urban experience is grounded and a feeling for nature is reawakened.

What are your favorite scents?

Madlaina: Warm and herbal scents united with a hint of patchouli, because it keeps you young.

Nicola: As described by Madlaina – the natural smell of Feuerstein Essentials.

Favourite international destinations?

Madlaina: Marrakech

Nicola: Hong Kong

To find out where you can purchase Feuerstein Essentials and to take a peek at the inspiring list of the flowers, herbs, and natural oils that create the products drop by their website: www.feuerstein-essentials.ch

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Categories: Collaborators, Interviews, Products

Contributing writer: Alicia Reuter

Freitag takes Vienna

White Line Hotels collaborator Freitag opens their first flagship store in Vienna, we can barely contain our excitement watching two of our favourites come together.

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Living on the Edge: Tribeca / New York

Introducing the first in a regular series promoting ‘Fringe Living’, inspired by our neighbourhood hotels that live and breathe on the raw edge of towns. It’s where local heroes become the catalyst with one specialist shop, one gallery, one bar, one hotel turning some once forgotten edge into the hub of originality. It’s where you wish you’d bought property years ago, it’s where you know you’ll impress your hippest, foreign guests.

What better way of illustrating our boho intentions than to introduce you to the area of Tribeca in New York.

Get the lowdown and Live on the Edge with White Line Hotels.

Original Beans Interview with Philipp Kaufmann

Original Beans is the kind of company that we’re glad exists. Scratch that, we’re more than glad; we’re lucky they exist, and that they give us, as consumers, such a wonderful way to help protect and sustain some of the world’s oldest rainforests. Not only are they passionate about their responsibility to the environment, they produce one of the most delicious treats on the plant – chocolate. Cocoa beans harvested in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru or the DR Congo each create a unique bar with notes ranging from the hints of tropical fruits in the Piura Porcelana, to the deep richness of smoky tobacco in the Cru Virunga bar.

We had a chance to talk with Philipp Kaufmann, one of the founders of Original Beans, to get a better understanding of the world of cocoa and conservation. Kaufmann was instilled with a sense of responsibility to the environment at an early age, since then he’s been committed to making the world a better place, and not just through chocolate.  Before co-founding Original Beans in 2008, he started NABUUR, an online platform to connect volunteers in developing villages around the world, allowing them to address local issues, collaborate on projects, and exchange ideas.  Kaufmann has also worked with the WWF in Geneva, run an investment partnership in New York to protect biodiversity hotspots, and initiated a project to reforest the deserted delta of the Colorado River with the world’s first saltwater forest.

You’ve worked in a variety of fields, how did you become interested in chocolate and conservation?

I grew up with a deep sense of nature, spending my childhood years in the forests, lakes and mountains of Southern Germany. I learned about the old, sustainable farming traditions, but my love for conservation runs in the family. Over generations, my ancestors have been earth scientists, agriculturalists and foresters. One of them, Georg Ludwig Hartig, is remembered for his late 18th century thesis about modern forest management, where he speaks of sustainability as the prerequisite of managing forests in a way to leave future generations as much as the current has. I have always felt intuitively that this is one of the most important ideas of my lifetime, challenging as it may be.

The times we live in call for a new kind of enterprise, one that protects and restores the Earth. Chocolate is both delicious and restorative, and it conveys our deep relation with tropical rainforests. Chocolate in the truest sense is a tree-treat. Original Beans exists to replant trees and conserve rainforests.

For every bar of Original Beans that is purchased, a local farmer plants a tree that helps sustain the rich biodiversity of the forest.  How do you meet your farmers?

The farmers we work with are very small farmers, which is, in a way, a rule of ours. There are two reasons we usually end up working with small farmers. First of all cacao is a small farmer crop, so most of the cacao in the world is planted and produced by small farmers. Secondly, which I think is similar to, say, an apple, if you would go out in Germany today to find original apples, you would end up going to remote valleys and find small farmers who have orchards with particular varieties. Cacao is, of course, different, but there are similarities.

Our reach to those small farmers is based on long-standing relationships with local intermediaries – a farmer cooperative, or a local cacao trader. In all of our current origins, we have had relationships for years and then we’ve decide, “Let’s start something there, let’s build it up” and after a few years the cacao might be of a quality we can use to make chocolate.

Conching is the process of combining the ingredients for chocolate, binding them and releasing their full flavour, and giving it the rich smooth quality chocolate lovers seek. The beans have varying conch times, ranging from 20 to 72 hours depending on the bar.  Could you talk a little bit about this process?

It is extraordinary how the conching process develops the flavour details of those few ingredients during the long hours we conch. It’s our call to say: now, after 20, 40, 60 hours, stop, this is the peak flavour moment, it doesn’t get any better than that. There are many philosophies and technologies when it comes to conching. At Original Beans, our take is ‘true to bean’ and subtle. To this end, we also make use of different conching technologies, among them the original, friction-heated conches that Mr. Lindt developed in the 19th century. We want you to taste the originality of the natural, wild honey-flavour in the Beni Wild, but we want other notes to remain alongside – like a bouquet of flavours as diverse as the rainforest itself.

Your first batch was in November of 2008, how the company developed since then?

Well, we’re still a start up company, and in start up companies, big things happen every day. Getting a batch to market is like coming out of the garage. Over the past 1 1/2 years our positioning is right, what we stand for and how we communicate is appealing. Which is interesting because we believe in a new wave of consumerism. We think that the choice that people make in their consumption habits is more and more evident to them, and everybody else.  We think it’s really about choices.

When does the new packaging come out?

The new packaging comes out in November. It says on the packaging that it’s 100% tree grown, and of course the cacao comes from the tree, but what is interesting is that the foil is also from wood. What we wanted to achieve is that you can take all of the packaging and just throw it in your garden, or on your compost – it’s fully renewable, and fully compostable.

Our designs are the product of intense collaboration with the Department of Graphic Sciences in Los Angeles. And since we wanted to produce a packaging that comes from nature and can go back to the garden compost, the work on the packaging also involved a lot of technical experts and testing.

Our considerations all develop from the core of our ecological mission which states: The Planet : Replant It. We wanted to create a graphic language and experience that is both intimate as chocolate should be, and explicit as the call to eco-action needs to be. We have given our packaging a tactile feel and there are a many details to discover. It should feel as much like a gift to oneself as to others. At the same time, we are using strong colours and the old symbol of the tree to stand out distinctively.

What challenges does Original Beans face?

Growing a company is always a big challenge.   As a small producer, the question is how to reach large numbers of people. Once you’re working with retailers, you’re suddenly in an environment with 20 other chocolate bars, to be able to survive in the face of that competition is a big challenge.  We’re building a solid foundation.  Our product is on target and we are growing our community.  We are also carefully choosing the right people to work with as partners.

To manage the entire supply chain, as we do, is a constant challenge. For example, we’re getting to market now, and it’s almost the Christmas season for the consumer, but we’re thinking about purchasing the beans for the next year. In November, when everyone has the Christmas market feeling, on the other side of the planet farmers are harvesting cacao, and we have to focus on that at the same time.

Will Original Beans be growing in the future?

The new range of chocolate bars will grow from three to four.  In our case, because we have a long-term commitment to origins, we cannot expand our range quickly.  If we were just going to buy beans and make chocolate from them, I could just call on a trader and purchase a ton of beans and make chocolate from that. This is the standard model for chocolates and it’s an easier model.  The majority of the chocolate companies that you see on the shelf follow that model, including in the organic market. Many companies go directly to the chocolate company and say “We’d like to have this chocolate, and please put this wrapper around it, and send it to us.”

The most intensive model is when you actually get involved in the growing of the beans and that’s really a long-term commitment.  You can’t just replicate across origins every other month.  We have four origins at the moment, and from that we make four chocolate bars. If people like a particular chocolate, we may do variations on those beans.

What ingredients go into your chocolate?

In the case of Original Beans’ pure chocolates: micro-grinded cacao mass, cacao butter, and organic cane sugar – that’s it.

What are the essential qualities for good chocolate?

Good beans. As a rule of thumb, we say that out of 100 percent quality in the final product, 50 percent is added by nature, 25 percent added by farmers, and 25 percent added by manufactures. So 75 percent of what our taste buds get excited about is created in a remote, rural and under-developed situation in war-torn Virunga or in the Amazonian wilderness of the Beni. That’s the reason why there are still so very few good chocolate products to choose from.

Also, for Original Beans, the value chain is important. Or put differently: all the people who bring this product into existence and to the consumer from the tree in Congo to the shelf in London. I use the term value chain, which usually describes the increase of economic value along a supply or production chain, because it has such a wonderful double meaning. Shared values, not just economic value, among dozens of experts is the secret of Original Beans’ quality.

There is a boom in artisan chocolates; do you see the trend going towards more environmentally friendly producers and smaller batches?

From our standpoint, we see a larger consumer trend. A move towards more comprehensive quality; towards products that are really good in the full sense of the word: tasteful, healthy, good for the producers and good for nature, affordable.

Some observers say consumers have moved from quantity to quality during this recession, but I think there is more to it. I think consumers are growing up to the awareness that not only are we what we eat, our planet is too. The most powerful choices we can make about the future or our world and ourselves happen in the shopping aisle, every day. That is actually very empowering, amidst all the crisis news that dis-empowers us.

Any plans to diversify your range of bars?

No, in this we are purists, and if we do inclusions, we would look for inclusions from the rainforest. I call this true to bean.  We want to make people follow the “terroir “, the taste of a place, and to develop that consciousness. Cacao and chocolate are completely underrated.  You can see this in the price.  This has dramatic consequences for the farmers, which are the poorest people in the world, and for the rainforest, because costs are constantly externalized.  There’s just not enough money on the ground in the local cacao economy to pay for responsible management of forest and nature and the lives of people, unless we as consumers appreciate chocolate in a different way.  And we believe that is in the quality of cacao and the taste experience.  Until consumers appreciate chocolate differently the situation is not going to change, and we are going to continue losing rainforest due to the fact that we eat chocolate, while it should be exactly the other way around. This is what Original Beans is proposing, that we gain rainforest by eating better chocolate.

Do you have a favourite place in the world? Somewhere that inspires you or relaxes you?

I find any country inspiring in its own right. Having said that, the United States is where I lived and worked for several years and continues to inspire me as a nation that struggles more transparently than any other with the sustainable and responsible transition from consumer materialism to natural capitalism. On the other end of the spectrum, my experiences in Eastern Congo inspire me deeply. This is a place as non-material as it gets: people live in clay houses, cook over open fire, and commute on bare feet. People are just regaining peace and confidence after a terrible war. And while their circumstances couldn’t be more different, they share the 21st century with us: they use cell phones; they trade with China; and they will decide what happens to the common heritage of the African rainforests.

Are there any steps that you see that everyday people can take towards achieving sustainability?

I think taking it seriously.  As a consumer I have to remind my self of the power of the choices I make.  I have to take it seriously, and the choices are immense. They may involve walking a few more meters to another retailer, or postponing a shopping trip, and waiting to go online to an organic online retailer, or paying a little more.

I think the community of environmental companies is trying hard to offer the same quality of goods with more environmental credentials.  You get the environmental product with the same pricing, and on top of it you get social and ecological quality – the playing field is not fair.

I think everyone should book a trip to the tropics, or a place where you can see an ecological crisis. There are places, even close by, where the experience of ecological destruction becomes visceral.  If you can see a rainforest, and smell the slash and burn fires of a forest, it becomes internalized, and you can feel that something isn’t working. From then on, your €2 chocolate bar is going to have a certain taste of charcoal to it.

OriginalBeans.com

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Contributing writer: Alicia Reuter

Escape the Agony of your Office

As I’m writing this, I’m looking at my surroundings.  The room is filled with light, the windows are open for a bit a fresh air, I’ve got some of my favourite books lined up in front of me for inspiration, and my eyes fall to the desk.  Ugh, it’s terrible.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s solid, spacious, and clean, but it was an E-Bay purchase because the hunt for my dream desk was taking too long. My pens are stuck in an old piece of ill-formed and oddly coloured pottery, and I won’t even go into the shoebox that holds the extra cords and memory sticks or the unsightly lamp clamped to the table. And yes, I love my Marcel Breuer chair, but it is not appropriate office furniture.

Why is it that I’ve taken so much care to make sure the room is inspiring, and yet the pieces I really need are abysmal.  Well, mostly because I just don’t have the time to go place-to-place hunting for the bits and pieces of my ideal office.  I deserve something better.  We all do.  Think about it, we spend a large portion of our time at our workspaces, they should inspire us, not make us want to run.

If you’re in Cologne next week, and this might just be worth the trip, drop by Orgatec at the Cologne Exhibition Centre. A fair for modern office furniture may sound terribly boring, but think about how much more exciting it would be to work in an environment you actually like being in.  It may be that all you need is a new lamp, or perhaps you’re in for a bigger purchase, like a chair or desk.  They’ve certainly got you covered. From classical furniture to modern lighting, it’s bound to be interesting to anyone with an eye for design.

If you need additional inspiration, on the 29th of October visitors can participate in Insight Cologne.  The evening will be filled with presentations, performances, and readings, all supporting the idea of visionary office design.  New trends from office layout to the facilitation of communication will be discussed, and tours through some of Colognes newest office spaces will take place.

White Line collaborator, Architonic, has created what is, in our humble opinion, undoubtedly the best guide to the fair.  It’ll usher you from carpets to chairs in no time, and has plenty of inspiring images and event listings to help you discover your own style. Be sure to drop by their booth in Hall 9.1, and give them a big “hello” from us.  You can download the guide on the Architonic website (so worth poking around on) here: www.architonic.com.

www.orgatec.com

Within a stroll of the exhibition hall you’ll find The New Yorker Hotel.  The minimalistic touch of architect and owner Johannes Adams can be seen throughout the space. Simple, gorgeous, and efficient rooms will have you thinking about how to redecorate your bedroom when you’re done with your office.

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Categories: Cologne, Design, Events, Exhibitions

Contributing writer: Alicia Reuter