Jibbi Little demonstrates how to take a good design up to world competition standard, with her technically improved Fantastic Mr Fox.
Competition pushes you to grow as a barista, latte artist, and person. Not only do you need to progress your skills and mindset, you need to develop and refine your designs.
Sticking to a theme across a competition year is often a good idea and can give you direction, but each time you rise to a new level – from regional to national to worlds – more is expected of what you can do in the cup.
In the August 2019 edition of BeanScene, I shared the Fantastic Mr Fox design I presented to win the 2019 Australian Latte Art Championship. View it here. It was part of a series based on my favourite books as a child. I wanted to continue this theme when I went to the 2019 World Latte Art Championship in Germany but knew if I was going to present this fox again, it would need to show even more flair and skill.
While much of the design of this new pattern is similar to its previous iteration, there are two elements that were introduced to better display my ability as a latte artist.
The first was to rework the neck or collar of the fox, featuring a second rosetta in place of the pull through from the first. This required a greater degree of skill and awareness of how the two rosettas would interact with each other in the cup.
The second, and much trickier of the two, was to add another ear to the fox. Working such a physically small element into limited space was a challenge that required experience in planning a pattern as well as executing it. Ultimately, I was able to achieve this by repositioning the first ear to point closer to the rim so I could work in the second ear in the wider space to the left that was now available. Doing this also allowed me to extend the face and add more detail.
This is the type of growth, not just in skill but thinking, that competition provides.
This article appears in the October 2020 edition of BeanScene Magazine. Subscribe HERE.
Jibbi Little’s Fantastic Mr Fox 2
Step 1
Build your base with the cup handle positioned at three o’clock.
Step 2
To start the body, pour a crescent moon shape beginning three quarters down the middle of the cup and end near seven o’clock.
Step 3
In one movement, draw a small loop from the end point of the C to the middle and back. Then, drag a line that is parallel to the start point of the C.
Step 4
Drag another line straight down the cup, beginning slightly higher than the C and connecting the two points of the body. Pour a second line forming a narrow V shape.
Step 5
Pour a nine-leaf rosetta running along the top of the V. Pour another eight-leaf rosetta along the right of this to form a curved V.
Step 6
From the mid-curve of the C, pour a 10-leaf rosetta up along the edge of the cup until 11 o’clock. Then, drag through alongside the rosetta until you touch the C shape again, forming the tail.
Step 7
From the top of the neck rosetta, pour a small triangle for the first ear, followed by a pointed loop to the left for the second.
Step 8
From the same point, pour an oval beneath the ears, drop a small amount of foam (leaving a space to form an eye) and drag back outwards to form the snout.
