Hard Rock Cafe opening in Kyoto in beautiful machiya townhouse building

soranews24.com -- Jun 05

Music-themed restaurant doesn’t want to rock the boat and instead incorporates local cultural into its design and food items.

There’s an interesting dichotomy to Kyoto. On the one hand, the city was the capital of Japan for more than a millennium, and so remains a center for the country’s cultural traditions. But on the other hand, it’s also a city of nearly 1.5 million people, who also have interests more modern than calligraphy and flower arrangement.

So really, Kyoto is a mix of contemporary and traditional elements. Because of its strong connection to old-school arts and aesthetics, though, modern businesses often make the effort to blend in rather than stand out when opening branches in Kyoto, and the latest to do so is the Hard Rock Cafe.