SEPTEMBER 7 (Reuters) — The spirit of one of the greatest TV shows of all time lives in Turkey’s largest city of Istanbul where customers wear hazmat suits and taste meth shaped candies.
Inspired by “Breaking Bad” series, Walter’s Coffee Roastery is Turkey’s first “coffee lab” that started as a Kickstarter project.
“It’s actually a long process because it took around 10 months to open up. I wanted to open up a big, huge coffee shop for people where they can feel comfortable and Breaking Bad is just an inspiration actually because it look like a laboratory but it’s just an inspiration. I came up with the idea because my cousin looks like the main character of the TV show and it was actually just a joke between us and it became reality,” the owner of the coffee shop, Deniz Kosan, said.
Similiar to the overalls worn by Walter White and Jesse Pinkman, the staff wear yellow jumpsuits and sometimes even gas-masks. Kosan wants to expand his lab and open the coffee shops around the world.
“We are right now in talks with Dubai, Moscow and also New York which will be in the first quarter of 2016,” he said.
Loyal Fans of the show are regular customers of Walter Roastery.
“We’re liking it a lot actually I’m very glad to be in Istanbul so I can visit here,” said customer Mathew Carol.
“It’s great I think, it’s not gimmicky so it doesn’t feel like it’s a gimmick of the show. It feels quite authentic,” said another customer Ferhad.
A Turkish customer, Irem Akbay, finds it very exciting to be part of her favorite show.
“The atmosphere is really beautiful. The things we see in the show came to reality here and it’s really exciting to be part of it,” she said.
Seated under a giant periodic table, customers taste crystal-topped cupcakes along with blue rock candies.
Although Kosan does not have copyright clearance for Walter’s Roastery Coffee, he says they have been very careful with the theme and avoided any breach of copyrighted material.
