London, United Kingdom
Chai is drunk by over a billion people around the world. Yet it is still brewed in a humble pot. It often boils over and is difficult to clean. With the Loka Chai Maker, making authentic chai at home has never been this easy; or this good.
Loka Chai Maker byPentagram, won a 2025 Good Design Award from The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design and European Centre for Architecture, Art, Design, and Urban Studies.
The design brief for the project was to develop a device that makes chai quicker, cleaner and easier than anything on the market, solving an array of issues: frequent boil over, constant monitoring, messy clean ups.
The design solution was developed through iterative testing and incremental improvements to the design of the conical top, inner basket and rim, which led to an innovation – the patent pending ‘chai fountain’ characterised by liquid boiling from the outside of the conical top inwards.
This eliminates the boil over and enhances brewing. The integrated strainer and ergonomic handle make drip-free pouring from any direction a delight. And it’s easy to dispose of the blend and clean all the components after use.
The materiality references classic South Asian cooking equipment, with design details and manufacturing quality that are inspired by modern technology as well as coffee and tea making machines.
It has a distinctive silhouette and a unique handle that was designed to blend into the overall form. The design has met with success across multiple markets due to its functionality, ergonomics and aesthetics.
The primary material is food-grade 304 stainless steel with a non-stick ceramic coating on the inside. The thermal performance of the base pot is improved with welded layers of 430 stainless and 3003 aluminium.
The integrated strainer is stainless steel, and the handle is injection moulded from nylon. The core idea of the chai maker has the environment in mind, encouraging consumers away from teabags which release billions of microplastics, towards loose leaf tea and spices. We also steered away from Nespresso style pods for this exact reason.
The manufacturers of the Chai maker and the packaging were chosen because they met Loka’s high quality, ethical and environmental protection standards.
All packaging is constructed from 80%+ PCR kraft paper so it can be broken down for recycling. Following the development and manufacture of the product, Loka is now a B Corp Pending company, committed to meeting high standards of social and environmental performance.
By enabling customers to integrate the Chai Maker into their daily ritual, Loka’s mission is to reduce single use cup purchases and disposable sachets and teabags, moving instead towards more sustainable CTC black tea and spices.
Project: Loka Chai Maker
Designers: Jon Marshall, Chifen Cheng, Shing Lo, Amelia Kociolkowska, Vincent Fan, Harc Lee, Pentagram
Manufacturer: Loka
