No, it’s not a new conceptual art installation or a previously unknown foray into concrete by fascist Italian Spatialist Lucio Fontana. It’s a coffee shop.
Mamonaku Kohi, a Japanese-inspired cold coffee stand better known as the “Hole-In-the-Wall” coffee shop in the Philippines’s Quezon City, has been amassing millions of views on social media for its atypical yet straightforward storefront, which consists simply of a gaping hole in a slab of concrete.
There are no doors, no windows, no seating, and no bathrooms — yet the absence of these amenities doesn’t seem to be an issue for customers. Videos uploaded to Instagram and TikTok show staffers passing beverages through a jagged fissure resembling one in a demolition site to customers lined up outside.
Mamonaku Kohi first opened its doors — erhm, wall — in early August. While it is one of four locations in Quezon City and Manila, the country’s capital, it is the only one whose takeaway counter is a giant hole. In lieu of verbal communication, customers order drinks by filling out laminated picture cards that hang to the side of the aperture.
However, while the coffee shop certainly stands apart from businesses nearby, its punctured facade is not one-of-a-kind. In the comment section of one TikTok which has since garnered more than 1.4 million views, users have pointed out that the store’s quirky concept resembles that of Anakuma Café in the Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo — a takeaway coffee shop where a furry bear paw passes customers their drinks through a hole in a green wall. It, too, is waging war on small talk: Its wordless ordering procedure involves a tablet.
Originality aside, it’s safe to say that the business ventures have put a hole new spin on takeaway.
