La Pavoni Europiccola: an italian piece of art from 1980.

La Pavoni mod. EUROPICCOLA

As a good Italian, I love coffee manually made (possibly with a vintage coffee machine). Making an Espresso, for many, is an art: from the grinding, to the pressing into the filter with a strong stainless-steel tamper, until the magic moment of extraction — that’s the Epic Win or Epic Fail moment.

I’m a bit rough, so most of the coffees I made with my Europiccola were EPIC FAILS!

See the old video below:

☝️ Yes, that's me in 2016! ☝️

I discovered the Europiccola by chance on the web in 2015. The Europiccola is a masterpiece of Italian design, produced since 1961 and still in production today in many incredible versions.

Legend says that one is exposed at the MoMA in New York since 1974.

For sure, Europiccola appeared in several movies, such as:

Live and Let Die (1973), the 8th movie of the James Bond saga

Ransom (1996)

About a Boy (2001)

As a lover of historic and weird stuff, there was no way I wasn’t buying one!

Well, after a little search, I found mine on Subito.it in early 2016 and paid 90 euros. The seller told me it was a wedding gift — probably not a welcome one. In fact, when the machine arrived at my home, I immediately noticed its near mint condition. Not bad for a 35 years old unit — and a big deal for the price!

Disassembling a Europiccola is not difficult if you have a bit of technical experience.

A big help (and a big thanks!) to Francesco Ceccarelli’s guides, that you can find THERE!!

Best way if you want to try to buy and restore a second-hand Europiccola.

I totally disassembled mine, cleaned it, and replaced all the washers with new ones and genuine grease.

After that, the machine started a new life: it worked great!

The funky orange grinder you can see in the photo is the original Mazzer from my grandparents’ café, used in the ’70s.

In conclusion:

I used the Europiccola more or less two years. During this time I tried hundreds kinds of grinding and many kinds of coffees, strong pressing or light pressing, more coffee or less coffee in the filter, but no way:

I did only black coffees with no cream. So, I got tired and I put the machine in my garage from 2018 until the autumn of 2025, when I rescued it, disassembled and cleaned again. Now I’m waiting for the new washers kit from LA MACCHINA DEL CAFFÈ.

That’s the reality:

these kinds of machines need good experience and a lot of precision for doing excellent coffees!

Machines not for everyone, of course.

But I want to give myself another chance!

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Remember,
if you want to buy a brand new Europiccola:

La Pavoni

If you want to buy a second hand one and you need parts:

- La Macchina Del Caffè, best italian store for La Pavoni's parts:  LINK

- For turorials and technical drawings: Lever Espresso Machines, by Francesco Ceccarelli. LINK


Thanks for reading and see you on Sunday!

~ Chris ~