William Li is the founder of SIES Products, an Atlanta-based brand dedicated to elevating daily rituals through meticulous engineering and intentional design. His deep-rooted passion for the "fine tastes" of specialty coffee and tea led him to identify a gap in the market for high-performance, aesthetically unified brewing tools. His flagship product, the Volarr Brewer, was born from the conviction that professional-grade extraction should not be sacrificed because of a busy lifestyle. By meticulously merging modern engineering with the traditional craft of mouth-blown borosilicate glass, he created brewing gear that is as technically precise as it is sculptural. This dedication to form and function earned the Volarr Brewer the European Product Design Award in 2025, cementing the brand’s place at the intersection of artisanal heritage and modern, high-output lifestyle.

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For me, the necessity was born from a conflict between a high-pressure professional life and a deep-rooted love for "fine tastes." Over the years, through the influence of family and friends, I fell in love with the complexity of specialty coffee and loose-leaf tea. I developed a palate that craved nuance, but my lifestyle began to pull me away from it.

During my career in consulting, I hit a wall of frustration. Any tea expert will tell you that there is only one way to truly unlock a specialty tea’s potential: Gongfu Tea. But a traditional ceremony requires an entire arsenal: a Gaiwan, a strainer, a pitcher, and a tea tray. When you are buried under a heavy workload, that ritual becomes an impossibility. I was on the verge of giving up on specialty tea entirely because I saw a massive gap in the market. On one hand, there were low-quality, oversized tea pitchers that ruined the leaves. On the other hand, there were traditional pottery Gaiwans that required too much space and time. Neither fit my lifestyle, and neither satisfied my craving for a refined, precision-brewed cup.

The "aha!" moment happened one afternoon after a long day of meetings. I was staring at my Gongfu set that was right next to the coffee pour-over which I had used that morning. I realized that the primary mechanical difference between these two worlds was simply contact time.

I called my best friend from college, a fellow tea enthusiast, and we obsessed over a single question: How do we turn a precision pour-over dripper into a perfect immersion tea brewer? One week later, the first magnetic stopper mechanism was born. By using a magnetic pull to keep the brewer naturally sealed, we created a vessel that allows for the controlled immersion tea requires but instantly releases with a simple press. By integrating the strainer directly into the glass, we eliminated the clutter of the traditional ceremony.

The Volarr Brewer is my "quiet conviction" that you shouldn't have to choose between your lifestyle and the drink quality that you enjoy. By removing the stopper, the user can transform the device. You aren’t just left with a tea brewer; you have a high-performance, flat-bottom coffee dripper. Moreover, we leveraged the rigorous engineering of a world-class coffee dripper, optimizing the wall angle and ensuring it fits a standard 185-size filter. The Volarr Brewer is one piece of glass that respects the engineering of both rituals.

The hardest constraint that we faced was adhering to a non-negotiable principle: Zero Plastic.

In the world of precision coffee and tea, plastic is often the "easy" choice. It is heat-resistant, easy to mold into complex shapes, and offers a nearly 100% manufacturing pass rate. But for us, plastic was a compromise on the "pure taste" of the brew. We were convinced that no material is cleaner or more inert than borosilicate glass, especially when you consider the concerns around microplastics and flavor absorption.

However, choosing glass turned our manufacturing process into an engineering mountain. Generally, borosilicate glass is made in one of two ways: machine-made or mouth-blown. Machine-made glass is standardized and consistent, but it is incredibly limiting. Machines prefer simple, cylindrical shapes, the "straight up and down" look of a common water pitcher.

Because of the Volarr Brewer’s functional requirements, our design features a dramatic difference in diameter between the "neck" and the "bottom." This forced us to use traditional mouth-blown methods. While this creates a beautiful, artisanal piece of glass, it is notoriously difficult to standardize.

The most grueling technical challenge is the base. For the magnetic stopper to function, we have to laser-cut a perfect circle into the bottom of the dripper. The glass must be perfectly flat, and the circle must be precisely centered to ensure a vacuum-tight seal. In a mouth-blown environment, achieving that level of mathematical precision is nearly impossible. Currently, we have a 70% pass rate, meaning nearly one out of every three brewers is rejected during our rigorous Quality Control (QC) because it doesn't meet our assembly tolerances.

This constraint sharpened the final product by forcing us to bridge the gap between art and industrial precision. We didn't just design a brewer; we designed a bespoke QC and assembly process in which every mouth-blown piece undergoes the scrutiny of a high-tech component. The result is a brewer that feels like a piece of art but performs with the reliability of a laboratory tool.

The decision that I had to defend most vigorously was including the bespoke magnetic stopper mechanism.

Throughout the design and manufacturing process, there was constant pressure to abandon our custom magnetic design in favor of "off-the-shelf" parts. The logic from the factory was simple and financially compelling: there are plenty of ready-to-use immersion valves on the market. They are spring-loaded, housed in plastic, and would have required zero new tooling or molds. Using them would have slashed our production costs and simplified our assembly overnight.

I held the line because those parts would have hollowed out the soul of the product.

Standardizing with a plastic, spring-loaded housing would have absolutely ruined the aesthetic and tactile experience of the Volarr Brewer. A premium brewer shouldn’t just perform well; it should be an object you look forward to using every morning and one you are proud to leave on your counter as a centerpiece.

I was convinced that if we used a cheap, generic plastic valve, we would be no different from the mass-market tea pitchers I was trying to escape. We weren't just building a functional tool; we were building a sensory experience.

By insisting on our own custom stopper mechanism, we achieved a "clean" look that honors the glass. The mechanism feels intentional and weighted, more like a precision tool than a disposable kitchen gadget. We chose the difficult path of creating our own molds and perfecting the magnetic stopper because I believe that the "premium feel" (the weight, the click, the lack of visible plastic) is exactly what makes a ritual feel special. We defended the design so that the final object would be worthy of the fine tea and coffee being brewed inside it.

We removed the visual "noise" of the individual part.

In the specialty coffee and tea world, objects are almost always designed as isolated components. Even when a brand creates a dripper and a carafe within the same collection, they often speak completely different design languages. When you put them together on a counter, they look like a coincidence rather than a choice. They don't look like they belong together.

We refused to follow such a fragmented approach. We left the "mismatched set" on the cutting room floor.

We are convinced that unity is the soul of a product. We didn't design a dripper and then find a carafe to match it; we designed a single, cohesive silhouette. We stripped away the seams and the clashing geometries that usually exist between the brewing vessel and the server.

By removing the independence of the parts, we created a product that feels like one intentional piece of architecture. There is a specific joy in using an object where the lines of the glass flow seamlessly from the top of the brewer to the base of the carafe. We removed the "utility" look of a kitchen tool and replaced it with a unified form that honors the ritual. When you look at the Volarr Brewer, you don't see a "kit" of accessories; you see a singular expression of how tea and coffee should be prepared.

From here, SIES Products will continue to expand within the specialty coffee and tea niche. Our roadmap is focused on producing tools that are intentional with their function and perfected in their design.

One thing that will never change is our core belief: your everyday drink tastes better when you use gear that is both scientifically designed and beautifully executed. We refuse to see "utility" and "beauty" as separate goals. Moving forward, we will continue to bridge that gap, ensuring that the objects you use to start your day are as refined as the tastes you’re pursuing.

I would point toward Flur Glassware and the Josephinenhütte wine glass. Both are redefining the role of glassware by using beautiful, unconventional designs to radically improve the sensory experience of drinking, whether it’s specialty coffee or fine wine.

@flurglassware · @josephinenhutte

My wired apple earphone.

The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman.

I usually wake up around 8 AM, cook some breakfast, and head into work. Around 3 PM, I break for an hour at the gym and then have dinner at 6. After dinner, I do some more work before winding down around 9 to watch TV with my wife, and we're in bed by 11:30.

My recent best purchase is an Owala water bottle. The push-to-open lid makes drinking while driving so much easier, and the 30 oz capacity fits perfectly in a car's cup holder.

Perfection is impossible. Get it functioning first and then improve it bit by bit over time.

Cold brew, no sugar.