Croatian Design Superstore, organizer of the festival Design District Zagreb and accelerator of the local design scene, in collaboration with Franck, created the concept of functional, mobile station for preparing and serving coffee and tea, which brings the identity of the Franck factory and almost 125 years of its production history and culture closer to the general public. The impressive design of the modular Franck Pop-Up, signed by product designer Draga Komparak, will make its first appearance before Zagreb citizens and tourists within the Design District Zagreb from June 16 to 19.
With this project Franck builds upon its orientation towards innovation, this time in cooperation with the Croatian Design Superstore, which employed their characteristic design approach to devise the concept of an attractive mobile catering station for Franck, where they can prepare and serve coffee and other hot beverages.
“The conceptual solution of Franck Pop-Up mobile station was designed to reflect the centuries-old tradition, contemporary spirit and innovative focus of Franck, both in product development and in communication with consumers. Collaboration with the Design District Zagreb is part of our long-term strategy through which, among other things, we provide support to the Croatian design and craft production, but also to valuable projects that contribute to the further development of quality of tourism and hospitality offer in Zagreb where Franck made another step forward with the project to revitalize the city café Johann Franck,” said Kristijan Gregorić, director of marketing and development at Franck.
“Croatian Design Superstore entrusted the responsibility of transferring Franck’s tradition into a functional object into the hands of product designer Draga Komparak, whose design symbolically transfers the identity of Franck coffee factory to the streets. That’s how Franck Pop-Up came to be – a modular mobile facility, which consists of four elements, whose size and shape result from the function that the individual module fills, from the preparation of coffee or tea, over presentations to storing,” explained Ira Payer, creative director at CDSS.
Design conveys story of Franck’s factory
Production complex of Franck in Zagreb, in Vodovodna street, opened in 1892 as one of the first major plants of the food industry in Croatia. Franck factory was built by the architect Kuno Waidmann and is still a representative example of Zagreb’s industrial architecture and design. Franck Pop-Up embodies the long history and tradition of the Zagreb factory and its contribution to the culture of coffee and tea, in which Franck leads the market.
“The choice of materials played a key role in communicating the identity of Franck factory, from their very texture, color, or the association to the smell of freshly roasted coffee. For this reason, external volume of this modular system is dominated with visually impressive corten – material that creates a unique color of brass when it gets into contact with air, creating a contrast with the interior of the module where we used functional, easily washable black compact panel. Tones of cinnabar, clay brick colors, walnut, dark pieces of raw iron construction, they are all derived from the integral story that Franck has been telling for generations – through the contents of a cup of coffee and tea,” Draga Komparak explained the design concept of this new, impressive product, Franck Pop-Up.
In collaboration with the Croatian Design Superstore, Franck also hired a fashion designer, Ivana Ćuljak, who designed multifunctional aprons for Franck’s professional baristas. The simple apron is made of twill fabric with details in leather and rubber straps in black and white. “The idea is that the aprons are sustainable and are to be used for Franck’s future promotional events. Therefore, they were designed to be two sided, for wearing depending on the area of application. Thus, on the one side there is the classic black twill fabric for more classical events, and on the other side is the leather insert, which marks Franck’s baristas within the urban area, and rubber straps that crisscross in the back in the form of a letter X. Along with the aprons, which were designed specially for this occasion, the styling includes the ready-made products that make the designed aprons even more communicative in everyday urban setting,” Ivana Čuljak briefly described the design of Franck’s new apron which brings the brand presentation to an even higher level.
