Lakou Cart

Bonhomie Coffee, a Haitian inspired coffee bar business in Seattle, Washington, was in need of a second mobile coffee cart. I reached out to see if I could design one for them.

Besides the measurements, their only requirements were that the cart had to be able to be taken apart to be loaded into and out of a car. With this in mind, I came up with a basic design for how to make that possible. But something was missing. After taking some time to research Haitian culture, I cam across the term “Lakou”.

The photo above is from the pitch deck I presented to Bonhomie Coffee. Incorporating squares in the design served multiple use cases. It allowed the cart to shed some weight and make transporting it easier, and because there were now square cutouts all around the base, I could design custom 3D printed brackets to fit into the holes to allow shelving to display beans and merch.

Bonhomie Coffee loved the design and after agreeing on a final price, I created a schedule to get things done, estimating completion 12 weeks from 19 May. I will be documenting the process here and on Tiktok.