Malena Lopez-Maggi

Co-founder and creative director of The Xocolate Bar, an award-winning Berkeley artisan chocolate company. Twenty years of experience spanning original chocolate products, recipe scaling, packaging and graphic design, brand storytelling, client communications, contracts, finance, and the operational systems required to bring creative ideas into the world.

Professional experience

The Xocolate Bar · Berkeley, California
Co-Founder, Creative Director & Business Operator | 2006–2026

• Co-founded and helped operate an award-winning artisan chocolate company for twenty years, bringing hundreds of original recipes, products, and visual concepts from idea to market.
• Led creative direction and executed the company’s graphic design, packaging design, visual identity, marketing, brand storytelling, and customer-facing communications.
• Developed, tested, refined, and scaled chocolate recipes; established production methods, workflows, quality standards, and practical troubleshooting processes.
• Managed purchasing, ingredient sourcing, vendor relationships, budgeting, bookkeeping, payroll, and financial administration.
• Created operational systems, procedures, and documentation; handled internal communications, hiring, and some initial staff training.
• Managed external communications, negotiated client contracts, developed proposals, and coordinated custom commissions from inquiry through delivery.
• Navigated administrative, regulatory, and compliance requirements across food production, retail, and wholesale operations.
• Expanded wholesale distribution to nearly 400 independent boutiques nationwide and developed custom projects for museums, universities, corporations, and cultural organizations.

Selected collaborations and commissions

Asian Art Museum of San Francisco · KQED · American Craft Council · Chabot Space & Science Center · Mills College Art Museum · Meta · Maker's Mark · Sandra Cisneros book-launch collaboration

Chocolate education and curriculum

Tamalpais Community Education — Developed and taught The Chocolate Snob's Guide to Tasting, Single-Origin Chocolate, and An Edible History of Chocolate.

• Chabot Space & Science Center: Chocolate-based flavor and color perception programming.
• American Craft Council: Food-safe moldmaking and chocolate process demonstration.
• Mills College Art Museum: Catered the museum’s centennial celebration with a chocolate buffet.

Selected original curricula & educational programs

Developed original chocolate education spanning sensory evaluation, food science, cultural history, craft, design, and interdisciplinary art. Programs below distinguish delivered instruction from proposed course designs.

• Chocolate tasting & sensory evaluation (taught): The Chocolate Snob’s Guide to Tasting, Single-Origin Chocolate, and An Edible History of Chocolate — Tamalpais Community Education.
• Flavor & color perception (developed): An experimental chocolate-based program exploring how visual cues shape taste perception — Chabot Space & Science Center.
• Food-safe moldmaking (taught): Techniques for casting edible materials — American Craft Council.
• Edible Milagros: The Poetry of Chocolate (workshop design): A five-session interdisciplinary experience combining guided tasting, reflective writing, drawing, metalwork, chocolate tempering, casting, and a closing sipping-chocolate ritual.
• All About Chocolate (community education proposal): Five-course sequence covering Tasting & Sourcing, Tempering & Molding, All About Flavor, Making Bonbons, and Packaging & Presentation, including hands-on demonstrations and sensory evaluation.
• Mills College Art Museum: Catered the museum’s centennial celebration with a chocolate buffet.

Brand storytelling & creative direction

My independent studio art practice informs the visual imagination, material experimentation, and storytelling I bring to product and brand development. Explore my art portfolio at malenas.art ↗

• Developed a recognizable brand identity by bringing together unexpected flavors, humor, poetry, visual design, and culturally informed product narratives.
• Created product and packaging concepts that told a story through flavor, materials, naming, and presentation.
• Led brand communications and promotional storytelling for retail, wholesale, museum, and custom-commission audiences.

Selected work

Chocolate and packaging concepts →  ·  Selected commissions and collaborators →  ·  Customer stories →

Additional curriculum and branding samples are available by request.

Education and professional training

• MFA, Studio Art — Mills College, 2015, summa cum laude
• BA, Studio Art — Mills College, 2013
• UC Davis — Food Science short course
• Melissa Coppel Chocolate & Pastry School — Professional chocolate production training

Selected recognition

• 2007 — San Francisco International Chocolate Salon, Best in Show
• 2020 — Good Food Award, Cacao Fruit Jam
• 2023 — San Francisco International Chocolate Salon, Best New Product (Faux Brie / Chocuterie)
• 2025 — USA TODAY 10Best Readers' Choice, #7 Best Chocolate Shop in the U.S.

For chocolate consulting inquiries: founders@xocobar.com