Art, Tea and the Matcha Boom: Sandra and Kuros on Building MiSA in Vienna
At MiSA in Vienna, tea brings together the worlds of its founders: Sandra’s work with textiles and natural colours, Kuros’s ceramics, and their shared curiosity for flavour, travel and craftsmanship.
Having previously run a tea bar and gallery in the United States, they brought considerable experience to their Austrian venture. Yet the popularity of matcha would take MiSA in an unexpected direction, bringing both financial opportunities and difficult decisions about its identity.
I spoke with Sandra and Kuros about their journey into tea, the realities of running an independent business, and how they are making room for both contemporary matcha culture and the quieter pleasure of sharing rare teas.
1. Before MiSA, your lives were rooted in art, craftsmanship and travel. How did tea enter that world, and when did it become a business?
Sandra & Kuros:
Tea became part of our life together quite soon after we met at university in the United States. Kuros actually taught Sandra ceramics!
We both already drank tea. Kuros comes from an Iranian background, where drinking tea is part of everyday life. It was usually black tea, often Ceylon or Earl Grey, prepared as a strong concentrate and diluted with hot water.
Sandra grew up in Austria but never really liked drinking coffee, so she always preferred tea too.
What we hadn’t discovered was the world of fine tea. That changed when a friend took us to The Tao of Tea in Portland. It was a small, cosy shop, and we stayed for hours trying different teas. They practically had to throw us out!
That was a real awakening. We discovered flavours we hadn’t imagined and people working directly with small artisan producers. Tea became a serious part of our lives, and eventually we opened a tea bar and gallery in Washington State.
We also developed a wholesale business supplying matcha and drinks such as turmeric lattes to coffee shops around the country.
2. Sandra, you work with natural colours and textiles; Kuros, with clay and other materials. How do these backgrounds shape MiSA?
Sandra & Kuros:
Beauty and craftsmanship are important to how we live, including in our home. Bringing those things into MiSA felt very natural.
We spent a lot of time creating the space. Kuros built the furniture from scratch with a friend, using Japanese methods. Sandra made the textiles, and Kuros made the ceramics. We wanted that handmade quality to be present throughout.
Discovering fine tea added a drinkable dimension to the crafts we already loved. There was the visual experience, the tactile experience, and now this whole world of aroma and flavour.
Our love of food and spices belongs to that too. In Kuros’s Persian background, people are very passionate about food. Tea offered another way to explore those nuances through smell and taste.
All of that comes together in MiSA. The space, the ceramics, the textiles and the drinks are connected through the things we care about.
3. Was there a particular encounter during your travels that influenced what you wanted to create?
Sandra & Kuros:
Choosing just one is difficult. It has been a collection of experiences over many years.
Sandra’s work with textiles and natural dyes took us to places including Japan, Taiwan, Thailand and Morocco. We discovered different flavours and ways of working with tea, which gave us a broader understanding of how many things tea can mean to different cultures.
Sometimes the influence was aesthetic. Being in an old temple in Thailand or Laos changes your understanding of proportion, colour and atmosphere.
Sandra’s first visit to Japan, around 25 years ago, was especially memorable. Her textile teacher at university was Japanese, so that interest had already begun. Travelling there alone, without a mobile phone, meant being very alert and simply absorbing everything.
Our time in Oregon also shaped us. There was a strong culture of craft food, natural ingredients and discovering products such as fine tea and chocolate. Being surrounded by that curiosity during our formative years was important.
4. What was your original vision for MiSA in Vienna, and how did the experience differ from running a business in the United States?
We wanted to bring together our experience in tea and the aesthetic sensibility we had developed over the years. The idea was to create a space where we could share the wonderful teas we had discovered.
We also wanted to build a bridge between the familiar café world and speciality tea. Matcha lattes and signature drinks had worked well for us in the United States, so they became part of that approach in Vienna.
The business environment felt different, though. In our experience, people in the United States were often very willing to try something new. In Austria, tradition has a stronger influence. That tradition is beautiful, but introducing unfamiliar things can take more time.
We felt we had to work three or four times as hard to make the same amount of money. That certainly affected us at the beginning.
But things are changing. We see more curiosity and openness, and social media has also transformed how people discover places.
5. Was matcha always central to MiSA, or did its importance grow through customer demand?
Sandra & Kuros:
It was part of the concept from the beginning. We already had years of experience with matcha and long-standing relationships with Japanese producers and millers.
We offered traditional matcha, classic matcha lattes and combinations with ingredients such as coconut water, oat milk and vanilla. It was our bridge into the wider world of tea.
What surprised us was the intensity of the demand.
Early on, an influencer visited and made a beautiful video of us pouring a matcha latte. She said, “I’m going to help you,” and we didn’t really understand what that meant. The following week, it felt as though every influencer in town came to visit.
That gave us enormous visibility. Then the wider matcha boom arrived, and the wave pushed us forward.
We listened to customers and developed more drinks. We appreciated the growing queues, but there was also a little sadness: what about all the other wonderful teas we had?
Matcha became increasingly central because people loved it, and we adapted.
6. What brings customers through your door, and how do you help them discover more about tea?
For many people, the starting point is simply that they enjoy matcha. Some already know a great deal; others know it as a green drink they like.
When they come in, they can discover that there are different cultivars, different regions in Japan and different flavour profiles. It becomes an entry point into a much wider world.
Education is a huge part of what we do, but we want to draw people in without becoming pedantic.
We teach hundreds of people each year through our matcha classes. Our Matcha Magic workshops cover traditional preparation, contemporary drinks, history, cultivars, production and storage. We give people a thorough introduction.
We think word of mouth is a big reason the classes fill up. People appreciate learning from someone who can explain the product properly.
We also work with our business customers on training and education, although we cannot always control how they handle or prepare the matcha afterwards.
7. How do you balance quality, producer relationships and pricing, especially as demand grows?
We are fortunate to have stable relationships with good producers, some of which go back around 15 years. Those relationships have been essential.
From what we are experiencing, the matcha industry in Japan is under considerable pressure.
Demand has created uncertainty, rising prices and a lot of new intermediaries. We receive offers from many different people, while our established producers are struggling to keep up.
Finding new sources is difficult because many producers are already at capacity.
Our focus remains on high-quality matcha, whether it is served in our drinks, sold directly to customers or supplied to other businesses. The price we can offer depends on what our suppliers can provide. We negotiate where we can, but we aren’t going to abandon a relationship of 15 years simply to chase another offer.
We come from tea. Matcha has always been one kind of tea for us, within a much broader world. We want the best quality we can find, and we care about the people behind it.
Many of our connections developed through friends, curiosity and respect for the craft. That human connection is fundamental to how we work.
8. What have been the toughest challenges in running MiSA, and what has made the biggest difference to its financial sustainability?
Matcha has made the biggest difference to our financial stability. Selling and serving it has helped us pay the rent and cover the basics of life. That has been enormously important.
But it has also brought some of our greatest challenges. The shortages, delays, price increases and constant changes mean there is always another situation to deal with. Even during the week of this interview, something new had come up.
We have managed to get through it, but it has been very demanding. We have felt burned out.
Flexibility has helped us. We have always been adaptable people, and we have learned to move with the ups and downs.
Living as artists also taught us how to manage with very little. We don’t need a great deal, and knowing that makes uncertainty a little less frightening. If everything changes, we know we can simplify our lives again.
The matcha boom has helped us make a living from something we love, but managing that opportunity has required a lot of energy.
9. Why did you decide to give matcha its own bar, alongside the original tea space?
The takeaway matcha business needed its own home.
We had created a space for people to sit and enjoy tea, but the benches were increasingly becoming a waiting area for takeaway drinks.
We were grateful that people loved our creations, yet we missed the customers who came to drink oolong from handmade ceramics or spend time with other teas.
Some regular customers stopped coming because there was no space and no peacefulness. People interested in pottery also needed time and quiet to look at a piece and decide whether it was right for them.
We separated the spaces very consciously.
The matcha bar carries all the things that make MiSA what it is: our aesthetic, our care for flavour and quality, our producer relationships and our creativity. We love developing drinks for each new seasonal menu. The recipes are precise and carefully made.
We wanted to give this evolving matcha culture its own dedicated space, with the same intention and care that we bring to the rest of MiSA.
10. Looking ahead, what would successful growth look like for you?
We aren’t planning to open 200 more MiSAs!
Maintaining quality is already a challenge as a business develops. We want to keep serving the best cup we can and continue being who we are.
We have wonderful employees whom we really appreciate. Keeping MiSA a happy, good place to work is very important to us.
The matcha bar is becoming more stable after a very intense period. For a while, it felt as though we had jumped into a fast-moving river and were trying to keep our heads above water.
We also have ideas for the original tea space that we are still developing. At the matcha bar, we sell our speciality teas too, and we are exploring ways to draw more attention to them, perhaps by gradually incorporating some into the drinks menu.
For us, the future means continuing to share what we love while protecting the quality, relationships and atmosphere that matter to us.
Conclusive Remarks
What stayed with me after our conversation was Sandra and Kuros’s openness about the practical demands behind a beautiful tea experience. Matcha has helped support their livelihood while also asking them to rethink their spaces and how they work. Their story offers a thoughtful perspective on tea entrepreneurship: adapting to demand while continuing to make room for the craft, people and pleasure that started it all.
Credit Pictures: Kuros Zahedi, Lawrence Tooley & Xenia Nitzberg
Discover MiSA: misatea.com
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