It started with a photo posted by writer Jamila Rivzi two days ago with the caption: “Hipsterism has gone too far when your coffee comes deconstructed.”

The image of three beakers separately holding espresso, milk and hot water quickly went viral, but Rivzi is withholding the name of the Melbourne cafe to protect them from the “awful comments”, she told Broadsheet.

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Image from Jamila Rivzi's Facebook.

The Daily Mail Australia went live with a nonsense article yesterday anyway, inaccurately calling out the two brothers Steve and Trevor Simmons, who own Fitzroy cafe Industry Beans, as being behind the offending coffee.

“The Daily Mail contacted me yesterday after seeing that picture online and wanted comment around ‘deconstructed coffee’,” Steve told Broadsheet. He says he made it clear to the writer Candace Sutton the picture was not taken at Industry Beans.

“Waking up to the article this morning I was very hurt to see that she completely ignored this fact in the article and misrepresented Industry Beans,” he says. “The subsequent negative comments on the Daily Mail article are understandably very hurtful to our brand, business itself and also personally, given that Trevor and I put huge amounts of effort into what we do every day (which is really to serve up the best food and coffee we can).”

Steve says he can’t comment on the location, or the authenticity, of the original image.

So, the mystery of the deconstructed coffee remains unsolved. Although, considering the original Facebook post has been shared more than 4000 times, does anyone else find it strange no one has been able to identify the cafe? Is this all an elaborate hoax to compel us to look inwards and question the very foundations of our collective pursuit of the perfect single origin? Is this deconstructed latte a metaphor for our disjointed, perpetually busy modern lives? Lots to think about. Or, nothing at all, really.

Update: Case Closed on Melbourne’s Mysterious Deconstructed Coffee.