Kiss the Hippo opened its London roastery in 2018 and roasts organic coffee there on a Loring Smart Roaster. Each coffee is quality-checked by Q graders before it is bagged, packed into compostable pods or served in the company’s own cafés. Its baristas won the UK Barista Championship in 2018, 2019 and 2020, and they also run an SCA Premier Training Campus.

Kiss the Hippo buys organic-certified coffee and pays at least 50% above the Fair Trade price. With On A Mission it funds reforestation projects from Nepal and Madagascar to Colombia and California, and is “a genuinely carbon negative company”. The range runs from the Donna espresso blend, roasted a little darker for chocolate and caramel, and the George Street house blend, to single origins such as a washed Girma Tamiru from Idido in Yirgacheffe and rare lots from Felipe Arcila’s Jardines del Encanto in Quindío, Colombia. The first Mokka harvest from that farm was released exclusively to Kiss the Hippo in 100 packs, and poured on the brew bars in Bloomsbury, Fitzrovia and the City.

The cafés are spread across London: Bloomsbury, Soho, Mayfair, Covent Garden, two in Fitzrovia, Spitalfields, Shoreditch, the City, Chelsea and Richmond, with a Marylebone café opening soon.

Locations

1234567891011
View a larger map© OpenStreetMap contributors
  1. Kiss the Hippo Marylebone George Street2A George Street, London W1U 3QTMaryleboneOpen in Google Maps
  2. Kiss the Hippo Bloomsbury3 Bayley Street, London WC1B 3HABloomsburyOpen in Google Maps
  3. Kiss the Hippo Soho30 Golden Square, London W1F 9LDSohoOpen in Google Maps
  4. Kiss the Hippo Mayfair3 New Burlington Street, London W1S 2JFMayfairOpen in Google Maps
  5. Kiss the Hippo Fitzrovia51 Margaret Street, Fitzrovia, London W1W 8SGFitzroviaOpen in Google Maps
  6. Kiss the Hippo Fitzrovia Corner36 Berners Street, Fitzrovia, London W1T 3LYFitzroviaOpen in Google Maps
  7. Kiss the Hippo Covent Garden24 New Row, London WC2N 4LACovent GardenOpen in Google Maps
  8. Kiss the Hippo Spitalfields12 Brushfield Street, London E1 6ANSpitalfieldsOpen in Google Maps
  9. Kiss the Hippo Shoreditch145 City Road, London EC1V 1AAShoreditchOpen in Google Maps
  10. Kiss the Hippo City117 Cannon Street, London EC4N 5AXCity of LondonOpen in Google Maps
  11. Kiss the Hippo Chelsea285 Fulham Road, London SW10 9PZChelseaOpen in Google Maps

Elsewhere

  1. Kiss the Hippo Richmond21 Sheen Road, Richmond TW9 1ADRichmond, RichmondOpen in Google Maps

Partner cafés

Coffee on the shelf

Photograph: Kiss the Hippo