This captures something I feel every day living in Kyoto. The city is full of tiny, intimate shops — a reflection of a long history of family trade, local pride, and a built environment that supports small-scale commerce. I think people here genuinely prefer places with local roots, which helps keep big chains out and keeps the city’s special atmosphere alive.
I'm glad it feels accurate to you, haha. There are definitely small towns in America (and even old strip malls that serve immigrant communities) that capture this too. The Japanese do it very well though, they have a very supportive set of rules for it as far as I can tell.
I also wonder if this feeling stems from "concentration", or in a sense, purity.
What is common to a cathedral and to this coffee shop is that there are not many things competing for your attention. Sometimes I call this "freedom from distraction." There are no chores to do, there is no honking or ambulance, there is no reason to check your phone. These places disarm you.
They make it clear what you should focus on - the space, the music, God - and everything else is secondary. What is elevated is intentional, what is muted is also intentional. There should be no distractions. It is not a cacophony nor a free-for-all. Everything has a place.
I read about yokocho alleys in the book, Emergent Tokyo. Some of the stores and bars there are just 300 square feet, affordable and low-maintenance enough for almost any family to open up a business.
Is a 300 square foot store even legal in American cities? I'm sure the fire department would scream that it's a fire threat, while the zoning department would reject the application for not meeting minimum size requirements.
We make opening up your own business extremely difficult in the U.S.
Yeah - a few people pushed back here that a lot of this is cultural and Americans aren't interested in running a tiny barely profitable business, especially in their homes. And beyond zoning there all these other regulatory aspects. But to me that kind of relies on treating the Japanese as inherently different, when it looks more to me like they've simply made these regulatory barriers unusually low for a developed country, and allowed a lot of normal human creativity to present itself in the commercial/retail realm. It isn't some foreign thing to marvel at, it's what we withhold from ourselves with artificial costs and barriers.
In America, we measure success by growth, not by quality, durability or even profitability. The viral Covid-originated sourdough business is expected to open a brick-and-mortar shop, then move into a larger space, then build out a bakery for high-end restaurants, then open another retail outlet, and another and then be sold to a private equity funded specialty food company that closes the retail stores when margins peak ahead of being absorbed by a publicly-held conglomerate which will sell mass-produced loaves under the original viral brand name.
Our modern age demands that we optimize for efficiency and growth. Prioritizing the product and the experience is merely a means in America, not an end. So we are slowly, efficiently and inexorably draining whatever is fun, enjoyable and unique from our enterprises, institutions and daily lives.
Places that do not do this strike us as remarkable, wonderful and utterly unrealistic.
Amazing! Thank you for sharing. If anyone reading this is in Kyoto or knows anything cool/helpful about it, I’m going to be there for a month. Flying out day after next. Having a month long intensive with a master carpenter. I won’t have too much leisure time but I’m planning to explore as much as possible! Thanks 🙏
Love this piece. Can I entice you to visit Sacramento sometime? I can offer a tour of all our old ACUs and (actual) live-work units, which are exceptional by US city standards.
This is wonderful. I remember visiting Shuzenji once...and we stumbled on a coffee shop that just looked like a small storage shed, but inside was really lovely.
I believe strongly that Japanese civics and everyday bureaucrats was heavily influenced in a positive direction by the Akira Kurosawa film Ikiru (To Live)
It was a popular, and now classic film, by a director otherwise known for his popular samurai action films
The movie is about a local bureaucrat who is just trying to do as little as possible everyday to just make it to retirement, he discovers he has a terminal illness and decides to pull every favor he has built over his career to get a local neighborhood park built
Ah yes I have heard of it, didn't remember the name. Nice idea, huh? It's interesting how some of those themes appeared in older popular media. It reminds me a bit of "Great Guy," a not-great noir film from the 1930s with James Cagney, where he's a weights and measures inspector and fights corrupt businesses or something.
Having visited Japan, what you've described is one of my favorite parts of this country -- how you can find the coffee shops and other types of small businesses in someone's backyard (literally). Often these places aren't even visible on Google Maps based on my experience, so it takes a bit of luck (or lots of walking with the intention of possibly getting lost) to find these hidden gems :-)
I love this piece and your reflections! Especially pointing out the low barriers to entry.
Some states in the u.s. are moving that way, slowly making the restaurant in a house possible. After living in Osaka for some years, and running a small coffee shop in an old row house, I learned that Japan also benefits from zoning laws that make all of this possible.
This captures something I feel every day living in Kyoto. The city is full of tiny, intimate shops — a reflection of a long history of family trade, local pride, and a built environment that supports small-scale commerce. I think people here genuinely prefer places with local roots, which helps keep big chains out and keeps the city’s special atmosphere alive.
I'm glad it feels accurate to you, haha. There are definitely small towns in America (and even old strip malls that serve immigrant communities) that capture this too. The Japanese do it very well though, they have a very supportive set of rules for it as far as I can tell.
I also wonder if this feeling stems from "concentration", or in a sense, purity.
What is common to a cathedral and to this coffee shop is that there are not many things competing for your attention. Sometimes I call this "freedom from distraction." There are no chores to do, there is no honking or ambulance, there is no reason to check your phone. These places disarm you.
They make it clear what you should focus on - the space, the music, God - and everything else is secondary. What is elevated is intentional, what is muted is also intentional. There should be no distractions. It is not a cacophony nor a free-for-all. Everything has a place.
This is very well put! Also why I dislike online/QR code menus!
I read about yokocho alleys in the book, Emergent Tokyo. Some of the stores and bars there are just 300 square feet, affordable and low-maintenance enough for almost any family to open up a business.
Is a 300 square foot store even legal in American cities? I'm sure the fire department would scream that it's a fire threat, while the zoning department would reject the application for not meeting minimum size requirements.
We make opening up your own business extremely difficult in the U.S.
Yeah - a few people pushed back here that a lot of this is cultural and Americans aren't interested in running a tiny barely profitable business, especially in their homes. And beyond zoning there all these other regulatory aspects. But to me that kind of relies on treating the Japanese as inherently different, when it looks more to me like they've simply made these regulatory barriers unusually low for a developed country, and allowed a lot of normal human creativity to present itself in the commercial/retail realm. It isn't some foreign thing to marvel at, it's what we withhold from ourselves with artificial costs and barriers.
In America, we measure success by growth, not by quality, durability or even profitability. The viral Covid-originated sourdough business is expected to open a brick-and-mortar shop, then move into a larger space, then build out a bakery for high-end restaurants, then open another retail outlet, and another and then be sold to a private equity funded specialty food company that closes the retail stores when margins peak ahead of being absorbed by a publicly-held conglomerate which will sell mass-produced loaves under the original viral brand name.
Our modern age demands that we optimize for efficiency and growth. Prioritizing the product and the experience is merely a means in America, not an end. So we are slowly, efficiently and inexorably draining whatever is fun, enjoyable and unique from our enterprises, institutions and daily lives.
Places that do not do this strike us as remarkable, wonderful and utterly unrealistic.
Amazing! Thank you for sharing. If anyone reading this is in Kyoto or knows anything cool/helpful about it, I’m going to be there for a month. Flying out day after next. Having a month long intensive with a master carpenter. I won’t have too much leisure time but I’m planning to explore as much as possible! Thanks 🙏
Thanks!
Here it is if you want to go! https://www.google.com/search?q=nijo+koya+coffee&rlz=1C1ONGR_enUS1086US1086&oq=nijo&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDggAEEUYJxg7GIAEGIoFMg4IABBFGCcYOxiABBiKBTIHCAEQABiABDIQCAIQLhivARjHARixAxiABDINCAMQLhivARjHARiABDINCAQQLhivARjHARiABDIHCAUQABiABDIHCAYQABiABDIGCAcQRRg90gEHNzE4ajBqN6gCALACAA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Love this piece. Can I entice you to visit Sacramento sometime? I can offer a tour of all our old ACUs and (actual) live-work units, which are exceptional by US city standards.
Haha, maybe! Just got back from travel but I will keep that in mind!
This is wonderful. I remember visiting Shuzenji once...and we stumbled on a coffee shop that just looked like a small storage shed, but inside was really lovely.
Coffee and Jazz. Heavenly combination. Only surpassed by red wine & Jazz.
If I ever get back to Kyoto (one of my favorite places on Earth), I will check it out! I felt so fortunate to live close to that city for 2 years.
I believe strongly that Japanese civics and everyday bureaucrats was heavily influenced in a positive direction by the Akira Kurosawa film Ikiru (To Live)
Huh! Don't know it, how so?
It was a popular, and now classic film, by a director otherwise known for his popular samurai action films
The movie is about a local bureaucrat who is just trying to do as little as possible everyday to just make it to retirement, he discovers he has a terminal illness and decides to pull every favor he has built over his career to get a local neighborhood park built
Ah yes I have heard of it, didn't remember the name. Nice idea, huh? It's interesting how some of those themes appeared in older popular media. It reminds me a bit of "Great Guy," a not-great noir film from the 1930s with James Cagney, where he's a weights and measures inspector and fights corrupt businesses or something.
Reminds me of Perfect Days, the recent Wim Wenders film https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzZBbX5A1FA
Having visited Japan, what you've described is one of my favorite parts of this country -- how you can find the coffee shops and other types of small businesses in someone's backyard (literally). Often these places aren't even visible on Google Maps based on my experience, so it takes a bit of luck (or lots of walking with the intention of possibly getting lost) to find these hidden gems :-)
Spending time in one of these establishments in Japan is a rare pleasure in life.
Would it be possible for you to share a map link to the coffee shop?
https://www.google.com/search?gs_ssp=eJzj4tVP1zc0TCo3jM8uMTAzYLRSNagwMzAwNDAzSkxJTDJPTUxMsjKosDQxNDNINjE3NTY2T7NISvISyMvMylfIzq9MVEjOT0tLTQUA1ikVGg&q=nijo+koya+coffee&rlz=1C1ONGR_enUS1086US1086&oq=nijo+koya+coffee&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDQgBEC4YrwEYxwEYgAQyCggAEAAY4wIYgAQyDQgBEC4YrwEYxwEYgAQyDQgCEAAYhgMYgAQYigUyDQgDEAAYhgMYgAQYigUyBwgEEAAY7wUyBwgFEAAY7wUyBwgGEAAY7wUyBwgHEAAY7wUyBwgIEAAY7wXSAQg1NTc3ajBqN6gCALACAA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#lpg=cid:CgIgAQ%3D%3D,ik:CAoSFkNJSE0wb2dLRUlDQWdJQzN3cDNKY1E
I love this piece and your reflections! Especially pointing out the low barriers to entry.
Some states in the u.s. are moving that way, slowly making the restaurant in a house possible. After living in Osaka for some years, and running a small coffee shop in an old row house, I learned that Japan also benefits from zoning laws that make all of this possible.
https://thepossiblecity.substack.com/p/the-art-of-ignoring-trends
Always seems to be much to learn from how they do things...
Thanks again for the writing.