Ruru Cafe Shibuya wows customers by serving coffee and sweets on unique water tables

A new Tokyo hotspot, where your meal looks like it’s floating on water.

Tokyo is home to thousands upon thousands of cafes, so you really have to bring something different to the table to stand out from the competition. Doing that, quite literally, is a new cafe called Ruru Shibuya, where customers sit at unique “water tables” that fool the eyes into thinking your meal is floating on water.

This unusual cafe has been creating a buzz on social media since it opened in December at Shibuya Sakura Stage, a large commercial facility in Shibuya’s Sakuragaoka-cho, which had its grand opening in July last year.

This facility is a bit of a labyrinth that can be hard to navigate, as it’s divided into two parts, with the so-called “Shibuya Side” and “Sakura Side” located across the road from each other.

Ruru Cafe is located on the second floor of the Sakura Side, but the layout makes it tricky to find so we’ve circled its approximate location on the floor map below.

Even when you arrive at Ruru you might find yourself walking right past it as it looks more like a beauty salon than a cafe. The exterior design has a sleek, minimalist aesthetic, and the lineup of chairs outside is a sign of its popularity, as there can be long lines of people waiting to get in, especially on weekends.

Customers are required to order and pay upon entering the cafe, which is actually convenient as you can get up and leave when you’re finished without having to worry about waiting to pay your bill. Other requirements to note: 1. There’s a 60-minute time limit for each visit. 2. You aren’t allowed to touch the table display. 3. If you happen to drop something into the water, you’re asked to call out to a member of staff for assistance.

This is a cafe where you definitely don’t want to put your smartphone on the table, because…

▼ …it would be instantly submerged in water!

▼ The table number gives you an idea of the depth of the water.

The table is absolutely beautiful to look at, and it boggles the eyes with its perfect layer of Zen garden-like pebbles.

When you receive your order, you might hold your breath in fear that it’ll disrupt the pebble perfection, but fear not, as it’s covered in glass to protect its beauty.

▼ Meals don’t get more beautiful than this.

Your eyes will tell you that your order is floating on water, but look closely and you’ll see the secrets behind the illusion.

▼ The top arrow shows there’s a glass coaster holding the glass, while the bottom arrow reveals the glass tray that everything sits upon.

In case the image above is still a bit hard to work out, we’ve darkened the photo a little to highlight the outlines of the tray and coaster.

As the overall concept here is Japanese Modern, the drinks on the menu are mostly matcha lattes and hojicha (roasted green tea) lattes, and the sweets are reminiscent of yokan (a traditional Japanese sweet made with red bean paste that has a firm, jelly-like texture).

▼ When we visited, we ordered a Hojicha Latte (950 yen [US$6.20]), which came with a sweet latte-art heart…

▼…and a “Lava Rock Cheesecake” (1,000 yen), which looked like a piece of hardened lava.

This was another mind-boggle, because despite the sweet’s intense blackness, it tasted like a creamy cheesecake.

▼ The hidden fruit inside was another nice surprise.

The flavour of everything was enhanced by the beauty of the table, which the store calls Nure Sansui (literally “wet landscape”), as a play on the concept of Kare Sansui (literally “dry landscape”), which is the term for Japanese rock gardens or Zen gardens.

▼ The landscape is so wet that every time you lift your glass, drops of water drip onto the table, creating beautiful ripples on the surface.

This is actually the second branch of Ruru, with the original located in the city of Kamakura in Tokyo’s neighbouring prefecture of Kanagawa. As the only branch in Tokyo, Ruru Shibuya is in high demand and it gets very busy on weekends, so if you’d like to enjoy the meditative aspects of the wet landscape garden, you’ll want to schedule your visit for a weekday.

Cafe information
Ruru Shibuya
Address: Tokyo-to, Shibuya-ku, Sakuragaoka-cho 3-4, Shibuya Sakura Stage SAKURA Side 2F
東京都渋谷区桜丘町3-4 渋谷サクラステージ　SAKURAサイド2階
Open 11:00 a.m.-8:30 p.m. (last orders 8:00 p.m.)
Website

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