The Daikanyama area is a home to fashion and high class homes. Along its streets youโll find a clustered mix of boutiques and stylish storefronts leading towards beautiful residencesย and foreign embassies. Its locationโbetween Shibuya, Ebisu, and Nakameguroโmakes it a busy spot for pedestrian traffic; exactly the reason itโs now home to Woodberry Coffee Roasters’ย newest outpost,ย Perch.
Perch is Woodberryโs third opening in the Tokyo area, and their first foray outside of their home of Yoga. Owner Musashi Kihara told me there was some nervousness at opening in a new location; he said the sheer pace of life hereโbusy, hurried, and on the goโis a stark contrast to the relaxed suburban feel of Yoga.
Kihara says it was during a recent trip to Melbourne that he met Yuta Matsumoto, who worked at ST. ALi and Clement Coffee Roasters. On Kiharaโs travels through the city drinking coffee, he was amazed by the sheer pace of the coffee shops they visitedโsometimes serving 300ย cups a day, and on busy days closer to 700.
When Matsumoto returned to Japan, he and Kihara set up Perchโa place they hope will bring a slice of that busy to-go coffee lifestyle to an equally busy Tokyo location.
Perch is designed for the cup-on-the-go experience. Kihara says the spaceโbuilt by the Woodberry boys themselvesโis designed for ease and pace of work; theyโre hoping that as people learn about the location, theyโll start to see it as an easy place to go for a good cup of coffee.
Which isnโt to say they want to rush the experience. Woodberry has always been an enterprise run by friends doing what they love, and Kihara says this is true of Perch, too. โCoffee shops are about the people who work at them,โ he says, โitโs not the space we want at the forefront, but the people; they bring in customers and create relationships with them.โ
I sat at the back of the store on a stool, and I asked Kihara about expansion. After all, with Onibus having opened a new roastery location in Nakameguro, Sarutahiko Coffee opening locations all over the city, and Blue Bottle Coffee continuing to expand, it seems as though specialty coffee is slowly becoming a regular part of Tokyo life.
But Kihara isnโt so sure. He jokes that maybe when they turn Perch into a 700-cup-a-day location, maybe heโll be able to agree with me. He still wants more people to learn about what coffee is, but for the time being, heโs happy just serving coffee to a new crowd of people.
โEventually we’d like to visit the plantations, and the farms,โ he says, โbecause we haven’t done that yet. For now though, we just want to make this place busy.โ
Hengtee Limย (@Hent03) is a Sprudge.com staff writer based in Tokyo. Read moreย Hengtee Lim on Sprudge.