Stepping inside TenCups' palm-tree-filled, air-conditioned lounge felt like discovering an oasis. The walk from Shibuya station took longer than I had expected, so upon entering, my eyes immediately began scanning for cool, shaded corners to settle down. I checked my phone. I still had a few minutes to spare before my meeting with the lounge’s owner, Brian. A notification appeared: Excessive heat warning. Japan in July isn't for the weak.
I took my seat, had a long pull of water, and took a sip of my iced Americano. Feeling refreshed, I started to notice a few details beyond the sweat dripping down my neck. A track from Arc De Soleil's Live Jam in Polynesia was playing—a grooving instrumental that provided its own sensory respite from the heat outside. Green and gold tropical hues lined the walls, complementing the tribal art alongside them. Most notably, the other customers seemed much more relaxed than I was. They must have been there for a while. A guy was talking on the phone with headphones in, a smirk flashing across his face between sips of his drink. A pair of girls were chatting over coffee, each dressed in the latest fashion. A businessman in a tight suit typed away with a row of empty glasses stacked beside his laptop. Nobody looked out of place—not even me on my first visit.
Owners move differently in their own space. They waste no movement. Their steps are calculated, and they know where they like to sit. Brian was making his way over to me from the other side of the room. He’d been sitting with his team at a round table hidden behind palm trees that towered over the entrance—the type of spot where you can see everyone coming and going while maintaining your own privacy. Brian and I dove into our conversation immediately. The weekend beckoned. Given our time constraints, our intention was to focus on TenCups and its journey since opening nearly three years ago.
Born in the Bay Area, Brian briefly shared stories of how he originally set off to explore his mother's Vietnamese roots, traveling through Vietnam and Southeast Asia before eventually relocating to Tokyo twelve years ago. In the years since, he's managed VIP tables at 1 Oak in Roppongi, headed events for Trunk Hotel in Shibuya, and, three years ago, experienced a spiritual awakening. It was during that stretch of making sense of what he calls "the mysteries of the universe" that Brian met his partner—an architect and spiritual medium who can read more than just tarot. His first card flip for Brian was the Ten of Cups, one of the deck's luckiest. According to Brian, it’s a sign of good fortune in relationships of all kinds. His partner would go on to help design TenCups and, in a sense, name it.
Coming up on three years this January, TenCups is the physical embodiment of Brian's spiritual awakening. TenCups' tagline is “Southeast Asian Flavors, Mystical Energy, Magical Pours.” During Brian's travels through Saigon, one bar stood out to him: Summer Experiment, a District 1 cocktail bar known for building a story into every drink on the menu.
I checked my phone again. It wasn't too early. How about an Egg-spresso Martini? Seeing how iconic egg coffee is back in Vietnam, Brian wanted to bring that flavor to TenCups—a subtle inclusion of his Vietnamese background and previous solo travels around the country. I took a sip. It was mildly sweet, balanced perfectly by a kick of bitterness. There's another signature on the menu too: the Island of the Gods, named after Bali, Indonesia, one of Brian’s favorite travel spots. All in all, each drink fittingly keeps TenCups’ mystical branding alive.
Although Brian feels proud of TenCups' storytelling-infused cocktail menu, in recent years he's noticed how much he's needed to adapt. For starters, as someone who doesn't drink as much as he used to, Brian said TenCups has made real strides in its mocktail program—including a personal favorite of his: the Witching Hour Mule, made with homemade ginger-cranberry syrup and ginger beer. It’s a nod from him to the growing number of people who want to meet others in real life without needing alcohol to do it.
He’s also noticed how tired a lot of younger people in Tokyo are of the city's last-train culture. Once midnight strikes, you’ve either got to walk or hail a cab home. To avoid that, a lot of people simply catch the last train and call it a night. TenCups offers a middle ground: an evening spot to socialize earlier in the evening and still head home with your pride intact. This brings us to TenCups’ major pull: events.
After falling for the cafe-bar-lounge concept during trips through Indonesia, Thailand, and Vietnam, Brian wanted to bring that same feeling to Tokyo, but knew he'd need a real point of difference to make it work. Most weeks lean on the usual playbook: local DJs spinning tunes or visiting chefs offering one-off pop-ups, but they also include a more relaxed option for a night out: Wednesday night tarot readings. Looking ahead, Brian hopes to keep welcoming chefs and bartenders from around Southeast Asia, using TenCups as a bridge between food, cultures, and hospitality.
Mornings tell a different story. Brian noticed a lot of cafes in the area don't open until 9 a.m. or 10 a.m., so TenCups opens its doors at 8 a.m. for anyone who wants a quiet coffee and a book before the day gets loud. Every couple of months, on a Sunday or a holiday, the lounge hosts its signature event: a drag brunch with a rotating lineup of performers putting on a show for the crowd. That signature gathering speaks to the vision that matters most to Brian and TenCups: creating a space that makes all people feel welcome.
As someone who'd barely had time to get his bearings in Tokyo, I leaned on Brian, who's called the city home for years, to fill in the map. Much of the city's LGBTQ nightlife, he explained, is concentrated in Shinjuku Ni-chōme, Tokyo's best-known gay district. For those who spend most of their nights there, the concentration itself becomes a kind of subtle confinement: your options for a night out narrow to a tiny fraction of Tokyo, and friends who'd otherwise tag along sometimes feel out of place making the trip.
Brian wanted TenCups to offer something different—easy to get to and open to everyone. He pointed out a detail that summed up the whole idea. Turning to his right, he gestured at the painting above the bathroom: a row of faceless figures, none alike—a witch, a fairy, a mermaid, a centaur. The bathroom underneath carries the same idea a step further: a single, semi-separated room where toilet stalls and urinals share the same space rather than being split between males and females.
"All witches and wizards welcome?" I asked.
"Everyone welcome," Brian said.
As 5 p.m. approached, Brian and I finished our conversation. Outside, the asphalt had cooled behind the shadows of the building next door. It felt nice to unravel for a bit. All those knotted parts came undone for a couple of hours, and I could finally escape the non-stop machinery of Tokyo's metropolis. It was time to make my way back to Shibuya station.
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