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Dogs and the Art of Coffee

Creating images in a café
By Karen B. London PhD, January 2018, Updated June 2021

A café owner in Taiwan can sell coffee for nearly $20 a cup because of the value she adds to it with her art. If provided a picture of a pet, Chang Kuei-fang will produce an image on your coffee. Using a milk foam base to create a 3D structure, she then completes the look with brushes dipped in espresso, fruit jam or chocolate. She works quickly, taking 10 minutes or less to paint your dog on your coffee.

Chang has been doing coffee art for nearly 15 years, though she only opened her own café in 2011. Though her portraits include cartoon characters and her human customers, she is best known for her depictions of pets, especially dogs.

Once people purchase a cup of personalized coffee art, it is common for them to spend so much time photographing it that it goes cold before they can drink it. Even after taking pictures of the image, many patrons hesitate to drink it because they do not want to ruin its beauty.

Karen B. London, Ph.D. is a Certified Applied Animal Behaviorist and Certified Professional Dog Trainer who specializes in working with dogs with serious behavioral issues, including aggression. Karen writes the animal column for the Arizona Daily Sun and is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Northern Arizona University. She is the author of six books about canine training and behavior, including her most recent, Treat Everyone Like a Dog: How a Dog Trainer’s World View Can Improve Your Life