A Designer Food Boom in Tokyo

Downtown Tokyo is experiencing a designer food boom combining fashion and food. Is it because the Michelin guide designated Tokyo as the world best gourmet city?

In Ginza, a downtown area in Tokyo featuring many designer stores, luxury stores are opening restaurants or cafes in the same building. Armani opened its first Italian restaurant, the “Armani Restaurante” on the 10th floor of the “Armani Ginza Tower” on November 7.

At the bamboo styled restaurant, customers are given a menu designed by Giorgio Armani, 73. Now that people can taste the world of Armani at a relatively lower cost, it is always fully booked. When the store opened, Armani showed off the inside of the building to the media, saying, “I will expand the brand of Armani to clothing, food and household products.”

On November 30, the “Bvlgari Ginza Tower” also opened an Italian restaurant on the top floor. Dunhill opened the “Alfred Dunhill Ginza” bar lounge on December 1.

Chanel was the first boutique label to combine fashion and food in Japan when it opened the French restaurant “Beige Tokyo” in 2004. It is the only Chanel restaurant in the world. “Beige Tokyo” received a star in the Michelin guide recently.

Hermes opened its first café in Ginza in October 2006 and Gucci opened its second café in Ginza this year following its first in Milan.

“Zeil,” located in Omotesando, a fashion building that opened on November 2, has boutiques like Chanel and Bvulgari inside. Underground floors feature eateries and cafés. Bvlgari recently opened its store there along with a café with an open terrace.

Some department stores are filling their showcase first floors with world-themed dessert stores. On November 6, the newly opened department store “Daimaru” near Tokyo Station explained that its first-floor dessert stores attract both fashion lovers and gourmets. Free champagne tasting with every purchase of confections is becoming popular in Tokyo as well.

The Japanese media analyzes that such competition among luxury brands over restaurants is a reflection of the willingness to attract customers using food.

sya@donga.com