Cosmic Latte

The mug

This is the mug.

A mug glazed entirely in cosmic latte — body, rim, handle and interior all one pale warm cream, on a ground of the same color — Rendering · the first firing is being commissioned

The whole mug is the color — body, rim, handle, inside — glazed through and fired in cosmic latte, then measured against the published value. No print. No white ceramic underneath.

The first edition was printed — color on top of white ceramic. Printed isn’t the color, so it’s gone. This one is being made properly, with a maker who mixes their own glazes.

Follow @cosmiclattemug for the first firing, or write to hello@cosmiclattemug.com.

The discovery

In 2002, two astronomers averaged the light of the universe.

Karl Glazebrook and Ivan Baldry of Johns Hopkins University took the spectra of 200,000 galaxies from the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey and combined them into a single measurement: the average color of all the light in the observable universe.

Their first answer, famously, was mint green — a white-point bug in the software. When they corrected it, the true color of everything turned out to be a pale, milky cream. The public was invited to name it. Among the finalists: cappuccino cosmico, univeige, skyvory.

Cosmic latte won. The universe is the color of milk stirred into coffee.

λ average · turquoise retracted · beige confirmed · 2002

Every star that has ever burned, averaged together, comes out the color of your morning latte. We think that deserves a mug.