Everything has its time.

Dear friends,

I've been thinking about how to write this letter for quite some time.

Not because I couldn't find the right words, but because some things are difficult to put into words, especially when they have been such an important part of your life.

Ten years of GIOMECCA.

I was younger, perhaps more naive, certainly more restless. I had an idea of what pastry could be, and an almost unreasonable desire to give that idea a place in the world.

I didn't know exactly what GIOMECCA would become. But I knew what I didn't want it to be.

I never wanted to create just another pastry shop.

I wanted to create something with a voice, a character, an identity of its own. Something that could be recognised without even needing to read its name. A place where pastry wasn't simply something to eat, but another way of expressing an idea. Not just another copy of the latest trends, appearing across the city as though originality no longer mattered.

I wanted to build something that truly belonged to me. Not because I owned it, but because it carried something of who I was. A reflection of myself.

And so, little by little, GIOMECCA took shape.

Not all at once. Not according to a perfect plan. But through years of work, experimentation, mistakes, discoveries, doubts, convictions and personal growth.

There were mornings when the city was still asleep, and nights when the lights in the laboratory stayed on long after everyone had gone home. There were creations that took weeks to develop and disappeared from the counter in a matter of hours. Others never made it out of the laboratory at all.

There were moments when everything seemed to make sense, and others when nothing did.

There were beautiful days. And some very difficult ones.

I loved this work deeply, sometimes to the point of forgetting where the work ended and where I, and my own life, began.

Perhaps that's inevitable when you create something so personal, something that runs so deep.

Over time, GIOMECCA became much more than a place where I made pastries.

It became a language.

A way of expressing everything I believed in, everything I questioned, and sometimes everything I couldn't find the words to say.

Every shape, every texture, every contrast, every decision to remove something or begin again carried a part of that language.

Some creations stayed for years. Others were never repeated. Some had to be taken away, even when I would have preferred otherwise. Some of you had your favourites, and I know that certain pastries had become small rituals in your lives.

I've received messages from people who remembered a particular cake years after tasting it. People who had celebrated birthdays, anniversaries, important milestones, or simply made an ordinary day a little more special with something we had created.

And I've also received messages of disappointment, which I understand. That's part of the story too.

For a long time, I don't think I fully understood what all of this meant.

When you spend your days creating, correcting, questioning and starting again, it's easy to forget that what leaves your laboratory begins another life in someone else's hands.

A pastry can take days to imagine and hours to produce, only to be eaten in a few minutes.

And yet, somehow, its memory can remain for years.

There's something extraordinary about that.

Perhaps it's one of the most beautiful contradictions of this profession: creating something so temporary, hoping it will leave something lasting behind.

A memory.

But GIOMECCA was never about keeping things exactly as they were. It was never meant to be the guardian of other people's memories.

I changed my mind countless times.

I removed creations that people loved. I questioned ideas that had once seemed essential. I destroyed things to rebuild them differently. I followed instincts that didn't always lead anywhere.

And I made decisions that weren't always understood.

I know that.

But I never believed that creativity should be measured by how faithfully we repeat ourselves.

To me, creating has always meant searching. And searching sometimes means leaving something beautiful behind because you feel there is still something else you need to discover.

That hasn't always been easy, neither for me nor for those who followed our work.

And perhaps that's precisely where the magic begins.

Still, I have always preferred to create something imperfect but alive, rather than something perfect and incapable of changing.

Looking back now, I can see how much GIOMECCA has changed over these ten years.

And how much I have changed with it.

Perhaps that's what GIOMECCA has always been.

A self-portrait.

The deepest expression of myself that I chose to share with those who truly wanted to see it.

Not perfect. Not always easy to understand. Full of contradictions.

But honest.

A work made not only of what I created, but also of what I chose to leave behind.

And like every deeply personal work, it has carried both my greatest ambitions and my limitations.

There's a part of me in every stage of its existence. In the things that succeeded, in those that didn't, in moments of confidence and in moments of uncertainty.

I wouldn't erase any of them.

Because without those contradictions, GIOMECCA would not have been GIOMECCA.

And now, after ten years, I feel that this work, in the form you have come to know, has reached its conclusion.

At the end of December 2026, the doors of the pastry shop in Berlin will close for the last time.

Writing those words still feels strange.

How do you say goodbye to something that has occupied such a large part of your life?

Something you have built with your hands, defended with your convictions, questioned a thousand times, and carried with you every single day?

Perhaps there is no perfect way.

Perhaps some endings are not meant to be explained completely.

They simply have to be accepted.

I have never believed that a work of art loses its meaning when an exhibition ends.

A painting remains a painting even when the gallery closes.

And sometimes, the fact that something comes to an end makes it even more meaningful.

That's how I want to remember GIOMECCA.

Not as something unfinished.

Not as something that failed to last.

But as a work that existed, evolved, constantly questioned itself, and eventually reached its final form.

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the people who were part of it.

Every single one of them.

To everyone who worked alongside me over these years: thank you.

You brought your hands, your knowledge, your patience, your energy, and parts of your own lives into this place. Whatever GIOMECCA became, you helped shape it too.

And to all of you who walked through our doors, whether once or hundreds of times, I owe a different kind of gratitude.

You gave this place something I could never have created alone.

A meaning beyond my own intentions.

I could design a pastry, choose its ingredients, decide its shape and imagine how it should taste.

But I could never decide what it would mean to the person eating it.

That part belonged entirely to you.

To the family sharing a box of pastries on a Sunday afternoon. To someone choosing a cake for a person they loved. To the customer who returned every week for the same little dessert. To those who discovered us by chance and those who followed our work for years. Even to those who didn't appreciate the changes.

You may not have realised it, but you were part of this work too.

And perhaps that's what moves me the most as I write these words.

A work of art no longer belongs entirely to its creator once it becomes part of someone else's memories.

I created GIOMECCA from something deeply personal, but over time it became part of other people's stories.

I can't imagine a more meaningful achievement.

There are things I would do differently if I could start again. Decisions I would reconsider, moments I wish I had appreciated more, and days when I was probably too busy looking ahead to recognise what was happening around me.

But I wouldn't change the reason I started.

I wanted to create something that felt genuinely mine.

Something with its own identity.

Something that didn't need to please everyone to have a reason to exist.

And for ten years, I had the privilege of bringing that idea to life.

Now, it's time to let this chapter become what, sooner or later, it was always destined to become.

A memory.

Not a distant one, I hope. Not one that fades as soon as the lights go out and the doors are locked.

But a memory that returns in small, unexpected ways.

In a photograph. In a flavour someone still remembers. In a conversation about a pastry that no longer exists. In the thought of a place that, for a moment, was part of someone's life.

I don't need GIOMECCA to be remembered by everyone.

But if even a few of you carry something of it with you, then this work will have travelled much further than the walls in which it was created.

And that is more than I could ever have asked for.

Thank you for your curiosity. For your trust. For your patience when things changed. For embracing my ideas, even when they were unusual. For coming back. For allowing me to be part of your celebrations and your most ordinary days.

And thank you, above all, for giving GIOMECCA a place in your lives.

Some things are meant to be remembered, not repeated.

GIOMECCA was never just a pastry shop.

And it never will be.

With all my gratitude,

Giorgio Mecca
Founder, GIOMECCA