Cafés in Hakushima & Moto-machi

The shortest tram line

Route 9, the Hakushima line, runs 1.2 km from Hatchōbori to Hakushima with three stops in between: Jogakuin-mae, Shukkeien-mae and Katei Saibansho-mae. It opened on 23 November 1912 and is the only route that uses the line.⁸

Shukkeien and its tea house

The name means "shrunken scenery": the garden's own history traces it to a line by the Confucian scholar Hayashi Razan about gathering sea and mountains into one view, or to a miniature of West Lake in Hangzhou. In 1894, during the First Sino-Japanese War, it served as a sub-headquarters of the Imperial General Headquarters.³

The atomic bomb destroyed most of the garden on 6 August 1945, burning its buildings and old trees. Restoration began in 1949, the garden partly reopened in April 1951, and the work was largely done when the Meigetsu-tei pavilion was finished in November 1974.³

Sensuitei (泉水亭) is on the left inside the entrance gate. It serves a matcha set with a sweet, a sencha set, zenzai (sweet bean soup), amazake, udon and rice-ball sets, plus coffee, tea and juice, 09:00–17:00.⁴ Garden admission has been ¥350 for adults and ¥150 for university students since 14 April 2025, and free for school pupils.²

Coffee on the castle grounds

The Sannomaru, the castle's former tour-bus stop, reopened as a row of shops and restaurants on 31 March 2025, linked by a pedestrian deck to the stadium park and Hiroshima Gate Park. One of the first five tenants was SOKO CAFÉ, supervised by the Ueda Sōko school of tea, which bears the garden designer's name.⁵ It opens daily 10:00–18:00.

Obscura Coffee Roasters' PARK shop, at Moto-machi 15-1, has its roastery on site and sells beans and coffee drinks; its shop list gives Friday to Sunday opening only.⁶ O-shiro no Chaya (お城の茶屋), the Central Park kiosk at Moto-machi 21-5 is another stop for a drink in the park.

Hakushima's neighborhood cafés

Hakushima R (白島R), on the ground floor of the TOHAKU Building at Higashi-Hakushima-chō 10-4, roasts on a Giesen and serves specialty coffee devised with one of Japan's leading baristas. It sells four house coffees, R/1 to R/4, from Ethiopia, Colombia and Indonesia, and pays only by cash or PayPay.⁷

Nearby on Higashi-Hakushima-chō, 5 Feet Cafe is at 12-20 and Fukujusō Café (福寿草カフェ) at 18-14. Union Coffee (ユニオン珈琲) is at Hakushima Naka-machi 17-2, Kumoma (雲間) at Hakushima Kita-machi 16-22, and Cue.coffee south of the garden at Kami-Hatchōbori 5-1.