Finca El Mirador, Colombia — Washed Espresso

Elkin Guzman is one of Colombia’s more progressive and technically minded coffee producers, and someone we’ve worked with since around 2013. He runs El Mirador, a family farm with more than 70 years of history, inherited from his mother, Fanny Vargas. Drawn to applied science from early on, Elkin went on to study agricultural engineering at Cauca University in Popayán — a background that continues to shape the way he approaches coffee.

At El Mirador, production is built around careful observation, research and experimentation. After encountering the work of Brazilian agro-engineer Dr. Flávio Borém, Elkin began developing new approaches to fermentation and drying, pushing beyond conventional processing without losing sight of quality or structure. One of the results was a method known as Natural-Hydro-Honey: ripe cherry is first dried as a natural, then rehydrated, depulped and finished as a honey process. It is an unusual technique, but one that has produced coffees with a character as distinctive as the process itself.

Beyond his own farm, Elkin is committed to sharing knowledge with other producers in the region. His view is that coffee’s future depends on respecting and strengthening its past: farms are often multi-generational, and their long-term success relies on soil health, careful processing and the next generation being able to see real value in the work. For Elkin, producers are not simply labour in the supply chain — they are skilled coffee professionals, with expertise worth recognising, developing and rewarding.