You know when you go to a cafe and although the food’s not bad you can’t shake the niggling suspicion that the place would be vastly improved if it was the size of a sports hall and decked out like an episode of vampire anime Trinity Blood or an installment in the Castlevania series of gothic whip-cracking platform games? If so then Christon Cafe is right up your dark and cobweb strewn alley.
The name is appropriate in the sense that everything in this vast cafe quite literally has Christ on. Or the Virgin Mary. Or both. Several times. In any western country the overwhelming creepiness of dozens of Christian effigies crossed with the chintz of faux Halloween cobwebs would clearly be camp and tongue-in-cheek. This being Japan though the Of Rice and Zen team couldn’t be entirely sure that the place and indeed its clientele weren’t taking themselves extremely seriously indeed.
The main hall has the open feel of a beer hall. The large variety of table arrangements, stained glass windows and and chandeliers give each table its own feel and view. The waitress hands you a coffin shaped drinks menu and you peruse your surroundings. Every corner of the room is crammed with cherubs, gargoyles, angels, cobwebs and vampiric artifacts that you’ll soon forget if this was a Christian themed vampire cafe, or a vampire themed church group meeting hall. Whatever the thinking behind the hodgepodge of paraphernalia lying around the main hall, it’s an impressive folly to have collected and imported it all in the first place.
Around the main hall and lining the room are lower tables with sofas and red latex booths with red velvet curtains. A great place for a shady vampire to bring an innocent maiden in order to “turn” her. Or for a couple of elderly muppets to pass judgement on the proceedings. A glance around the booths revealed a few painfully trendy couples, a handful of giggling groups of mainstream birthday girls and a smattering of androgynous men/women who looked like they were on a casting call for a Rob Zombie vs Marilyn Manson video shoot and were killing time by scanning the room aggressively seeking out anyone who might have the cheek to look their way.
The food consisted of pretentious pate/cheese/nibbles selections that left even the Of Rice and Zen team, who are typically too busy to eat more than once or twice a week, hungry enough to order twice. Some of the side-dish style nibbles available included shrimp spring rolls, Peking duck rolls and a caesar salad. The fact that we were compelled to order twice is an extreme rarity and leads us to the belief that Christon Cafe is not catering to amused foreigners or hungry locals, but in fact genuine gosu-rori (followers of the “gothic lolita” fashion trend). Cafe Christon portions have to be small because, as has oft been remarked, you never see a fat goth. Except Robert Smith.
If you love paying through the nose for overdone, Munster-esque decor or you’re looking for a place to shoot a Hammer Horror revival it’s worth looking Christon Cafe up. If neither of the above apply to you, you’ll probably go once at most for the photo op. Although, to be honest you can probably get a tech-savvy friend to photoshop you into ours for less than the price of a Christon beer. If you wanna take those cheesily macabre holiday snaps yourself, there’s a branch on the 8th floor of the Oriental Wave Building in Shinjuku. For fellow Kansai residents, there’s a slightly less expansive branch in Osaka.
Christon Cafe Tokyo
Christon Cafe Osaka
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