Projet Chocolat

18th and 19th century colonial copper chocolate pots. 🤎

Which one is your favorite?

The first perfumers of chocolate were Indigenous🌺

Most people think of the French or Italians when it comes to perfume but many cultures and civilizations have incorporated scent into their lives. Indigenous people all over the world needed scent to decipher what was edible and it’s the sense that brought us cacao.

Indigenous people are also very sophisticated. They were the first to make drinking chocolate with flowers and it’s important to remember this.

I’ll be exploring this theme within my chocolate museum this fall and winter. The central questions to The Indigenous Story of Cacao chocolate museum are what was extracted? What was adapted? What was left behind?

Opening November 18, 2026
In collaboration with IndigeNash

📍Radar 615 radartdesignarchitectureresearch - Nashville, TN

🗓️ Sign up for my Newsletter to be the first to know the calendar of events through the new year!

Save the dates! 🍫
Projet Chocolat Events / Fall 2026

I look forward to seeing you.
Warm chocolate wishes,
Sophia

Arranging a myriad of vintage chocolate boxes. Inspiration for a project I’m creating with Heather, my creative director. She gave me a task for our next project that will be available at the chocolate museum this November.

Can you guess what we’re creating? 💙

Oh, and my blouse is by Boden

Sneak peak into next weeks drinking chocolate workshop Frist Art Museum 🤎

I look forward to sharing the indigenous story of cacao past and present through a hands on drinking chocolate workshop.

Vintage chocolate educational kits for school children. 🍫

Before social media, we had tangible items to influence and educate our children. These vintage kits are the perfect historical example of marketing
to youth.

Starting in the early 1900s, chocolate companies would send these kits to schools and teachers would walk them through the chocolate making process. Inside were maps, glass vials of cacao nibs, cocoa butter, cocoa powder, and roasted cocoa beans. The hope was children would remember the name of the company and purchase more bars.

These are just a few from my collection. Still intact and inspiring for current design and marketing.

Guess the decade before you swipe to the last slide and let me know which version you like best!

10 things I know about chocolate. Some history, mixed with science, art, and my own thoughts. 🍫

Share with a friend, the one you agree with the most.

Forgotten recipes that perfumed chocolate. 🌺

Borrowing from the perfume world, drinking chocolate in 16th, 17th, and 18th century Europe was perfumed with florals, spices, ambergris, and musk. Perfume was more than scent. It was medicinal and so was chocolate. So naturally apothekers utilized what they knew from the world of perfumery when making their drinking chocolate elixirs.

Save this for your next deep dive down a chocolate history rabbit hole and send it to the friend who’d try one of these recipes.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. The hierarchal system of craft chocolate. We’re dealing with different cultures, governments, and values. As some of you might already know, I’m a part of IndigeNash, an art collective here in Nashville. We disagree but never argue with ego because we have a common higher purpose. We always come together because we have a mission that we all agree upon. It’s a beautiful way and I truly believe it’s how the universe should work.

I know from IndigeNash that the lateral indigenous way is what the craft chocolate industry can look to for coming together. Until we have a common higher purpose that’s not implied but written, we’ll be like the Wild West.

How can we get there? What will it take?

What would you say is our common higher purpose?

I’m in chocolate art history curating mode. Taking space and storytelling into consideration plus looking through a vast collection is quite the task! Jenelle Porter, former curator at The Whitney Museum of American Art and The Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, had some helpful words for me. She said that every piece needs to connect and speak to each other. I immediately understood. She was very encouraging and yet I’ve decided like most everything, I can’t do this alone. I’m bringing in a co-curator.

It’s a vulnerable act to make art and it’s a vulnerable act to reveal what has been part of my inner world to the public. Every object has a soul and all will be revealed:

The Indigenous Story of Cacao
Chocolate Museum in collaboration with IndigeNash
November 18, 2026
Nashville, TN