Our story
A shop built on restraint.
Mercato started with one stubborn belief: that the most persuasive thing a brand can do is look like it was art-directed by a magazine — and that the ritual of a good cup of coffee deserves objects made to last.
We began in 2019 as a single market stall in Stoke, selling seconds from a local ceramics studio alongside beans we roasted ourselves on weekends. The pieces sold out every Saturday — not because they were cheap, but because they were considered. People wanted the whole ritual, not just the cup.
So we built Mercato around it. We work with a handful of studios and a single roastery, in small runs, with no two pieces quite alike. Oxblood became our spine — a confident red that reads as taste, never as a discount — and white space does the selling. Conversion, we found, follows confidence.
Today we ship to homes across the country, always carbon-neutral, always in recyclable packaging. The stall is gone, but the bet is the same: make things slowly, price them to live with, and let the product be the hero.
What we hold to
Four things we won't compromise.
- 01 —
Made slowly
Small runs, single studios, beans roasted to order. We would rather sell out than rush a firing or a roast.
- 02 —
One rich color
Oxblood is the spine of everything we make — a confident red that reads as taste, never as a discount.
- 03 —
Carbon-neutral
Every order ships carbon-neutral in fully recyclable packaging. The ritual should not cost the planet.
- 04 —
Built to keep
Pieces designed to survive a decade of daily use — chip-resistant glazes, borosilicate glass, walnut that ages well.
The craft
Small runs. One firing.
Nothing rushed.
Every glaze is mixed by hand and every bag roasted to order, so what arrives is genuinely one of a few. We would rather sell out than cut a corner — it is the only way the things we make earn a decade on your counter.
The people
A small studio, close to the craft.
Sofia Marchetti
Founder & buyer
Idris Bello
Head of roasting
Hana Okafor
Ceramics curator
Theo Lindqvist
Sustainability lead
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