Birth of the Hario V60

After the 2010 World Brewers Cup in London, the Hario V60 spread around the world. Named after its uniquely-designed cone shape and a 60-degree angle, the Hario V60 is now synonymous with the highest standards of craft in coffee making equipment.

Now a globally recognised coffee brand, Hario started life as an eco-friendly heat-proof glass manufacturer in Japan in 1921. With an approach focussing on in-house development and design, Hario have brought many coffee innovations to the market - Syphon, Slow Drip and, of course, its iconic product - the V60.

Creating an icon doesn’t happen overnight and the V60 is no exception. Back in 1980s trapezoid-shaped coffee drippers dominated Japanese market. Hario’s designers wondered whether a parabolic shape would help to achieve a cleaner-tasting cup by allowing water to pass through the grounds rather than steeping them. This resulted in the ‘Era of the Coffee Geek’, the first Hario conical dripper using wire rods to support a paper filter. It stalled in the face of the popularity of instant coffee and mechanical coffee makers, but Hario never forgot the success of the simple, but brilliant, structural change.

And so, in 2004, Hario’s designers revisited the method to invent the V60. Working closely with resin makers and potters in Arita, under serious time pressures, they sought to replicate the delicious taste of cloth-filtered coffee with a conical paper filter. The key was to let water flow naturally through the cone, which they achieved by adding the spiral ribbing. Trial and error experimentation delivered the current design of the V60 some 25 years after the first conical dripper had been created.

Of course, innovation doesn’t stand still. Hario’s ceramic V60 will soon be available in a range of stylish, different colours. It’s a new twist on an old favourite and is one of the many ways that Hario are ensuring they’re ready for the next 100 years.