French missionaries bring Bourbon and Catimor cuttings to Cau Dat.
The first highland Arabica in Vietnam takes root in cool volcanic soil. Cau Dat is named for what it gives: rich land, generous rain, a refuge above the heat.
Our story
The slow rebirth of Vietnamese Arabica.
In 1920 the French planted Bourbon and Catimor in the cool highlands of Cau Dat. A century later, on the same hillsides, we have learned the long art of caring for what they left behind.
1920
The first plantings
1920Plantings
1975Quiet years
2010Revival
2019Roastery
2026Today
Where it begins
A mountain that holds memory.
Cau Dat sits at 1,500 metres above sea level — high enough that the soil stays cool, the nights bring fog, and the cherries take their time to ripen. Slow weather makes deeper coffee. The land remembers everything: the French who arrived a century ago, the wars that emptied the hills, the families who returned and kept tending.
Plot 14 · Cau Dat
A century in chapters
Five moments that shaped Kingness.
After the war, the plots fall to weeds and disuse.
Coffee survives in pockets — small family rows tucked between cassava and tea. Robusta floods the lowlands. The Arabica gene stays asleep on Cau Dat's hillsides for two decades.
Three families pool their plots and start sorting again, by hand.
The Phạm, Nguyễn, and Lê families — neighbours for four generations — agree to harvest together. They reject the wet-mill model. They begin trying honey-process drying on raised beds.
Kingness opens a small drum-roaster in central Da Lat.
Eight kilograms per batch. Twenty-two minutes per roast. The roaster's name — Phương — has watched these cherries grow since she was a child. She still calls each harvest "the family's lot."
Single-origin lots from Cau Dat, shipped warm to the world.
We ship to twelve countries. Forty-two hectares are now under our care. Every bag carries the plot number and the name of the family that picked it.
Coffee is patience. The land gives only what you have earned the right to ask for.
How it's made today
Small batches, hand-sorted, honest paper.
Every harvest is sorted by hand, dried on raised beds, rested four to six weeks before roasting. Bags are stamped with the plot, the picker, the roast date. The price on the bag includes a share that goes directly back to the growers — above market rate, every lot, every time.
How we work the land
Sorting · 2026 harvest
Visit the roastery
Cau Dat is closer than you think
Open Tuesday through Sunday in Da Lat. Or write to us — we ship internationally.
Plan a visit