Meikyoku Kissa Lion
名曲喫茶ライオン · Meikyoku Kissa Lion
- Ward
- Shibuya
- Price
- ¥650~900
- Hours
- 13:00–20:00, varying by season
- Closed
- 1–4 Jan and four days in summer
- Getting there
- 10 min walk from Shibuya Stn, in the Hyakkendana quarter
- Founded
- 1926
- House rules, stated outright
- Nobody greets you at the door
- Every ground-floor seat faces the towering speaker
We do not republish copyrighted photographs. Use the links below to see the actual venue.
Obvious to locals, invisible to visitors
There is a simple reason guidebooks leave this out: to the people who live here it is too obvious to be worth explaining.
House rules, stated outright: no loud conversation, no photography of any kind, phones on silent with calls taken outside, no outside food. Even the staff move quietly. Walk in expecting a cafe and you will be caught off guard.
Nobody greets you at the door. Sit quietly wherever is free and water and the day's programme will arrive — the absence of service is itself consideration for the other listeners.
Every ground-floor seat faces the towering speaker. For the full effect, tell a staff member and take the front row upstairs. The left and right speakers are deliberately different sizes, calculated for resolution.
Scheduled concerts at 3pm and 7pm daily, with the programme handed to you on arrival. Outside those hours you may request a piece, or bring your own record or CD. The collection runs past ten thousand discs.
Founded in 1926, burned out in the 1945 air raids, and rebuilt five years later to exactly the same design. The lion reliefs and carved pillars were cut by the founder himself. It stands frozen in time amid the love-hotel signage behind Dogenzaka.
What it is
Shibuya is a ward where old cafes hold out at the centre of trends. Prices have been corrected by hand — raised, but with visible reluctance to look like they were raised. Cream soda looks deeper in person than in photos, and the glassware differs from shop to shop. Hours go irregular over long holidays; check before setting out. Leave large bags in a station locker; there is not much room inside. It would be a waste to stop at just this one — there is more of the same density within five hundred metres.
What to order
Why locals keep coming
The menu is simple enough that you cannot really go wrong — everything on it has been made for years. Not renovating turned out to be the strongest differentiator — this is a kind of space you cannot build new.