Founded by celebrated chocolatier Christine Sull Sarioz, Milla Chocolates recently opened a cutting-edge confectionery shop on Venice Boulevard in Culver City, California. The stylised store front offers a sweets boutique and café that pours a specialty brew by Coffee Manufactory and loose-leaf teas from Spirit Tea. The geometric shaped chocolate bars and bon bons are all made in house behind a translucent wall.
Sull Sarioz combines her background in fine and decorative arts – she worked at Sotheby’s and The Whitney – with her passion for all things chocolate and its precise execution. The stores’ Bauhaus aesthetic was curated by creative director Goktug Sarioz and reads more like a jewellery boutique meets art gallery. It comes complete with a custom Bang & Olufsen speaker on one of the entrance walls, replicating one of the multi-layered bars.
The minimalist cases feature an array of gold-dusted individual chocolates that range from Champagne to Kir Royale and Manhattan cocktail flavoured, along with Sull Sarioz’s best-selling and award-winning hazelnut Praliné bars – one version features Turkish coffee – and chocolate covered caramelised almonds with bourbon sea salt or raspberry and pink sea salt. If you’re buying a gift or taking the goods to go, the matt black packaging and gilt detailing will be a welcome standout at any soirée.
Sull Sarioz was announced as a Five Star Awards Master Chocolatier by the International Chocolate Salon, and was recently awarded Silver at the International Chocolate Awards in 2018 for her Blood Orange Bar, Black Sesame Caramel Bon Bon and Bronze for the Hazelnut Bon Bon. §
