24 best things to do in Yanaka: restaurants, cafés, shops and attractions

Upon spotting this charming old house on Yanaka's Kototoi-dori, most passers-by probably wouldn't guess that it's been home to a café for well over 70 years. Inside, you'll find a fusion of the time-honoured kissaten tradition and the newly trendy craft coffee ethos – no AeroPressing, just honestly good brew, best combined with a pick off the wonderfully retro food menu. Try the egg sandwich for a quick bite, or the weekly lunch for a more substantial option. 

Kushiage (skewers of meat, fish or vegetables) is not gourmet fare, but Hantei almost makes it refined. This is partly due to the care that goes into the preparation, but mostly because of the beautiful old wooden building. There’s no need to order: staff will bring course after course, stopping after every six to ask if you want to continue.

This unassuming kakigori shop is nestled down a small street in Yanaka and it only has five counter seats. If you’re lucky enough to snag a spot, you’re in for a treat as the shaved ice here highlights seasonal fruit and veggies sourced from farmers around Japan. 

With an abundance of fresh produce on rotation, the menu here never repeats itself. While seasonal fruit like peaches and plums will reappear every summer, they’re prepared in different ways or paired with other flavours for a new experience.

Anyone who thinks that traditional Japanese sweet shops are a dying breed should pay a visit to this charming Yanaka eatery. Himitsudo specialises in kakigori shaved-ice desserts, prepared with a traditional handle-operated machine and served with seasonal toppings (the selection changes daily). Himitsudo is unusual in that it keeps serving kakigori throughout the colder months too.

Kamachiku is one of the most beautiful udon restaurants in Tokyo. It’s a special place, set in a lovingly restored century-old redbrick storehouse, complete with a modern glass-box extension which overlooks a verdant Japanese garden.

The menu is just as impressive. The chunky, chewy udon – you can also opt for a thinner version – are of artisanal quality. Made fresh everyday and cut by hand, they are best eaten simple and unadulterated in one of two ways: cold noodles with cold dipping broth, or hot, where the noodles sit in a bowl of hot water and served with a hot dipping broth.

After years of travails at Ginza's now-closed Sakata, the owner of this udon joint opened his own shop on a Nezu backstreet and immediately hit it big: Nenotsu's chewy, elastic noodles and creative menu attract enough patrons for queues to form even on weekdays. We recommend the 'double udon' set, which consists of two ample noodle portions – one cold, one warm – but also like the quirky kama mentai butter, a variation on kamaage udon served with butter and marinated fish roe (mentaiko).

While Tokyoites mourned the loss of Scandinavian bread specialists Vaner, there’s now a new bakery taking over the exact same space. The new French boulangerie and patisserie Think has just opened at Yanaka’s Ueno Sakuragi Atari.

You can get a wide array of pastries and bread made using fermented butter and levain (or natural homemade yeast). Signature items include brioche, croissants and the bakery’s pain de campagne (French country loaf) that’s made with slowly fermented levain for a sourdough-like flavour and texture. If your sweet tooth is calling, there’s also a lovely selection of sweet pastries including dainty madeleines, caneles, cinnamon rolls and small cakes.

Waguriya is all about chestnut confectionery, serving everything from mont blancs to choux pastries filled with chestnut cream and wagashi (traditional Japanese sweets) made with the sweet nut. For a treat on the go, you can also buy a cone of fragrant chestnut soft serve. It’s made with all-natural ingredients, including a chestnut paste that’s made using nuts from forests in Ibaraki prefecture. The soft serve is creamy with the distinctly earthy, slightly sweet taste of the shop’s signature ingredient.

Whimsical onigiri specialist Risaku take their rice balls seriously: they have 30-plus filling options to choose from. Have one of the morning sets, which come with an onigiri or two, plus miso soup and/or side dishes – all for ¥600.

You’d be forgiven for thinking this Yanaka café feels like it’s been transplanted from the backstreets of Melbourne, Australia – because it kind of is. Cibi Melbourne is a beloved Japanese café and concept store in the hip Collingwood neighborhood, opened in 2008 by Japanese husband and wife duo Zenta and Meg Tanaka. In 2018, they opened Cibi Tokyo.

Step away from Shinobazu-dori near Nezu Shrine to find a certain very shitamachi-looking alley – one that’s also home to a supremely refined bar. It looks almost like someone’s home from the outside, so be careful not to miss the entrance.

Manning the bar is the reticent Morito Hasegawa, a veteran of Ginza’s Rock Fish. Having set up his own place in 2015, he makes a mean ‘ice-free highball’ and serves up a nostalgic selection of blended whisky.

No visit to Yanaka Ginza is complete without a stop at Echigoya Honten, a local institution that’s been slinging booze since 1904. The place is unmissable, with its barebones alfresco set-up of upturned milk crates for sitting on while nursing a cold beer from the tap or a local sake. It’s a comfortable, casual spot to bring the snacks you’ve bought along the way, enjoy your drink and maybe even strike up a chat with a local.

Serious coffee drinkers will appreciate the meticulously brewed roasts at Ignis Coffee. This small café in Sendagi features just a small counter, where you can sample premium coffee beans prepared with a variety of methods and paraphernalia. 

Here, hand drip coffee is served in matcha bowls, as the wide mouth allows you to fully enjoy the aroma. On the menu, you’ll also find a house-made coffee jelly with fruity notes as well as the Noir, a 'fake mocha' drink that uses just coffee and no chocolate and is finished off with espresso spritzed from a spray bottle.

Sip on local craft beers in an atmospheric wooden house. It is part of the larger Ueno Sakuragi Atari complex, which is also home to a bakery, shop and event space.

Formerly a bathhouse (the building is over 200 years old), this high-ceilinged space in a charming neighbourhood near Ueno Park features contemporary Japanese artists (Tatsuo Miyajima) and international practitioners (Lee Bul, Julian Opie). Like many of the Yanaka district's art galleries, the fact that it is situated in an antiquated building gives it a minimalist aspect that is at once both traditional and extremely fashionable. Worth a visit for the building alone.

A place for all things cat, Nekoemon Café is part of a small group of feline-themed shops around the Yanaka area. If you’re feeling creative, you can paint your own maneki-neko here while munching on cat-shaped cakes; their lunch sets, sadly without cat imagery, are worth a taste too. 

These three traditional houses in Yanaka were renovated into one complex of workshops, stores and residences, which include some rather innovative venues: a craft beer bar which feels like the set of an old Japanese movie, a store that specialises in salt and olives, and even more eclectic shops.

Dating from 1706, Nezu Shrine is an excellent example of large scale Edo-era shrine architecture. Featuring superbly contrasting vermilion and gold lacquered gongen-zukuri style buildings, its designation as an Important Cultural Property seems justified.

Also competing for attention is Tsutsuji-en, a 2,000 tsubo (around 6,600 square metres) Japanese azalea garden in the shrine’s precincts. Housing around 50 varieties of 3,000 azaleas, the garden attracts numerous sightseers each spring for its annual Bunkyo Azalea Festival. 

This is one of Tokyo's largest graveyards and, along with Aoyama Cemetery, one of its most picturesque. These days the avenue through the centre of the cemetery is usually quiet, but over 150 years ago it was a den of antiquity, lined with tea shops that doubled as brothels and illegal gambling dens.

However, the cemetery does still have its popular periods - notably during cherry blossom season. The Japanese are oddly fond of holding blossom-viewing parties in the grounds of the city's cemeteries, and Yanaka is noted for its blooming cherry trees. With over 7,000 graves, the area it covers is vast - so big, in fact, that the cemetery has its very own police station.  

This home and lifestyle shop in Yanaka offers a mix of beautifully crafted Japanese goods that you never knew you needed. You can hardly miss the store if you’re passing by – the storefront is overflowing with hand-woven baskets of every shape, size and colour.

A daily goods supplier since 1945, Matsunoya sells a miscellany of items ranging from brooms, dustpans, kitchen utensils, cutlery and homeware to leather goods and jewellery. 

In business since 1907, scrubbing brush maker Kamenoko Tawashi finally expands its business outside its original home, opening a branch shop on Yanaka's Hebi-dori (Snake Street). In addition to their standard tawashi, which work wonders on teacup stains, this shop carries white versions of the classic model, a line of brushes by Sri Lankan designer Liza and, for the serious fans, a selection of non-brush knickknacks adorned with the Kamenoko logo.

This lovely little vintage shop is tucked down a residential street in Yanaka and stocks a mish-mash of vintage dresses and blouses from Europe as well as secondhand accessories, bags and tableware. 

Most notable is the collection of secondhand vyshyvanka, the traditional Ukrainian white blouses often embroidered with colourful flowers.

This hotel shuns chain anonymity and encourages its guests to embrace the city and live like a local. Hanare’s staff will introduce you to gorgeous shrines, shops that sell local crafts and the restaurants Tokyoites eat at. Located in a down-to-earth district, Yanaka, the homely hotel has four two-person bedrooms and another three-person bedroom, all with tatami mat floors.

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