Tokyo café Breakfast Club — a favorite haunt of fashion, film and art folk — is landing in New York.
The establishment will set a one-week creative residency at the rising Lower East Side gallery Entrance, which was recently profiled in WWD.
Founded by chef and longtime Tokyoite Luli Shioi and actor Kunichi Nomura, Breakfast Club — located in Nakameguro — is a preferred pit stop for creatives visiting Tokyo, as well as the local artistic community. The café is regularly visited by film directors including Wes Anderson, actors like Norman Reedus, fashion designers such as Olympia Le-Tan and artists like Tom Sachs and Barry McGee. Harry Styles has also recently popped in.
Breakfast Club’s merchandise — T-shirts and hoodies designed by Le-Tan, the brands Cav Empt and Richardson, and the artist Cali Thornhill Dewitt — are souvenirs coveted by many streetwear-inclined tourists.
Its New York residency will run from April 15 to 21, overseen by Shioi as well as Cai Oglesby, a New York native who now lives in Tokyo and works at the café. Each evening will see a new event, each planned to appeal to the same kind of creative community that Breakfast Club serves in Tokyo.
Oglesby’s monthly spoken word night will be transplanted in New York on Tuesday evening. Shioi will cook a seated dinner on Wednesday evening, with tickets soon available for sale on Entrance gallery’s web site. There will also be music performances, a launch for the new issue of Dizzy magazine, a karaoke night and more.
“I’m from New York and moved to Tokyo one-and-a-half years ago. Breakfast Club has become an integral part of my settling into life and the community there, and similarly does this for other people who come to Tokyo. Luli created a space that’s homey and I wanted to bring that to New York,” Oglesby said.
While Breakfast Club’s T-shirts and hoodies will remain only available for sale in Tokyo, Oglesby and Shioi have created a new tote bag to mark their spoken word night, which will be available at the New York residency.