If there is one thing that we see in Maribel Lieberman’s chocolates, it’s style. As the founder of MarieBelle New York, we see her sense of style in everything she does—whether it’s a set of custom chocolates designed for Tiffany’s in their trademark blue hue, or her Winter Serenades Holiday Collection, which features women in stylish garb adorning her ganaches.
Lieberman owns MarieBelle New York, a Viennese-inspired chocolate boutique and hot chocolate bar in Soho. She first opened her shop in 2002, and Oprah Winfrey counts herself a fan, adding her chocolates to her highly coveted favorite things list.
Lieberman’s style-savvy designs hail from her love of fashion, and her background in design. After moving to the US in the early 1980s from Honduras, she studied fashion at Parsons School of Design. It led her to founding her own catering firm, which led her to specializing in desserts—her lifelong passion. With her high-end design degree, she combined her love of fashion with chocolate.
And funnily enough, it isn’t cocoa, but Coco, that inspires her. “I love Coco Chanel, her entrepreneurism and her style,” said Lieberman.
Her chocolates depict women wearing long, flowing dresses, as she counts style as her inspiration.
“It’s inspired by the cosmopolitan New York woman,” said Lieberman. “It’s today’s woman and the environment where I live, as a New Yorker. I love fashion and love to integrate today’s lifestyle with the brand.”
MarieBelle New York’s 2023 Limited Edition Chocolate Collection: Winter Serenades
Her Holiday 2023 collection includes Winter Serenades, which incorporates ornate gold hues with silver-trimmed snowflakes into her chocolate designs. Her chocolate ganache collection includes her New York City Chocolate Collection, which is inspired by her bustling life in the Big Apple, from streetscapes to landmarks and stylish women sauntering down Fifth Avenue. Meanwhile, her chocolate truffles range from dark chocolates to matcha-flavored boxes, and her Thanksgiving Collection is in colorful fall hues of red, orange and yellow. One design depicts women crossing the street in New York City, while walking their dogs with the Manhattan skyline behind them.
While Lieberman is the art director of MarieBelle, she has been working with a Japanese designer for the past 21 years, who helps her create square-based graphics for her brand. “MarieBelle is a lifestyle product, the way we make them is all artisanal,” she says. “I do think of it as a fashionable product.”
A trip to MarieBelle New York is not complete without visiting her hot chocolate bar to try out her signature hot chocolate, which includes her dark hot chocolate, spiced hot chocolate and her milk and hazelnut hot chocolate tins.
MarieBelle New York’s 2023 Limited Edition Chocolate Collection: Winter Serenades,
She’s also working on a collaboration with home décor brand Lee Jofa, which is celebrating their 200-year anniversary this year. Each Lee Jofa x MarieBelle artisan chocolate is adorned with a pattern from the iconic Lee Jofa ‘Tree Of Life’ design, as each chocolate bar is wrapped in the brand’s century-old historic print. “Putting all the art on the chocolate sets it apart from other brands,” said Lieberman. “It’s way more pleasant to delight more senses than just the palate.”
This design collaboration draws attention to the production of the chocolates she has been specializing in over the past 20 years. It draws attention to her ganaches, not only as their own works of design, but as fine art. “It’s all artisanal, every little drawing is applied, one by one,” said Lieberman. “At the end of each hand-painted chocolate, we have a nice little chocolate canvas that is beautiful to contemplate.”
Next up, she’s planning on launching the MarieBelle Chocolate x Del Maguey VIDA Puebla Chocolate Cocktail Box, which brings together mezcal with chocolate. The ganache box features seven cocktail-inspired flavors, which are all twists on bar classics that transports us to Oaxaca, Mexico. And then the holiday season is upon us. “I love the holiday season the best because we create seasonal flavors and packaging design that represents the beauty of the of the holidays,” said Lieberman.
MarieBelle New York’s 2023 collections
She’s currently promoting MarieBelle’s Chocolate Advent Calendar 2023, which features chocolate nutcrackers, dark chocolate caramel cones, chocolate covered blueberries, and more. It will ship the week of November 20.
Working on so many projects keeps Lieberman busy, but she loves fashion as much as she always has. “My all-time favorite fashion designer is Coco Chanel, because I feel she broke barriers,” said Lieberman. “And in some ways, I hope I am breaking barriers, too.”
Maribel Lieberman, founder of MarieBelle New York
