VietNamNet Bridge – While modern-style coffee shops and take-away services are springing up like mushroom after the rain in HCMC, The Homes’ owners start their business with the concept of simplicity, upholding traditional features.

Corners at The Homes Coffee and Folk Drinks .

Located at 23 Nguyen An Ninh Street, a quiet street near Ba Chieu Market in Binh Thanh District, The Homes Coffee and Folk Drinks is an old-fashioned two-compartment house where customers can sip healthy beverages in a relaxed ambience. The structure of the old house remains untouched because the owners of the coffee shop want to utilize the natural airflows coming in and out through an open skylight in the middle of the house. Furthermore, the design of this building respects traditional features in the way people of the old days built their houses. Traditionally, common characteristics such as the tiled roof, a skylight, whitewash brick walls, wooden windows and furniture of a house were believed to cool off the hot and humid weather in Vietnam.

Indeed, guests coming to The Homes can feel gentle breezes circulating inside the coffee shop even in sultry days. Entering this house, people may forget they are being in a noisy and crowded city. Instead, the feeling of peace will invade your soul if you choose to seat in the veranda under the skylight, next to the fish pond. The murmur of an artificial cascade mixed with the gentle melody of Vietnamese lyrical songs will release your mind from worries and tiredness.

Especially, The Homes is decorated with many items of the 80s-90s. Patrons can recollect many familiar household appliances here and there in this house, namely an oil lamp, an earthen pot, a thermos flask, a dial telephone or a vintage alarm clock. Beside sets of wooden tables and chairs, there are two plank beds, a kind of flat platform for sitting or sleeping, where customers can take a rest for a while if they feel like to do so. In the old days, Vietnamese families gathered in plank beds for lunch or dinners, and used them as beds at night also.

“I want everything feels like home here. Everyone coming here can enjoy the fresh air outside, or relax in an air-conditioned room inside. Especially, all of our home-made folk drinks served here are cooked with rock sugar. Among many kinds of Vietnamese folk drinks, we choose ones which are delicious, healthy and can be kept within one or two days, so that customers can always enjoy fresh drinks with no preservatives,” says Luong Kim Nguyet, 26, one of the two owners. Customers can find beverages with reasonable prices like corn, peanut, soybean or black sesame milk, as well as drinks made from water chestnut, lotus root, breadfruit, brown rice and many kinds of fruit and traditional tea in the menu. Besides, The Homes also serves snacks, soft drinks and coffee.

When asked why the coffee shop was named in English while following traditional values, Nguyet explains: “I had laboriously thought about giving a name to the shop, yet we chose an English name at last. We want to develop our business into a chain, making it bigger and closer to both Vietnamese and foreign customers. An international brand-name with good Vietnamese services will make us stand out from the crowd.”

After five months of operation, Nguyet and her partner are still putting all efforts on training the staff and improving quality of the beverages day by day. Almost all users of Foody.vn, a popular website of foodies, who have been to this coffee shop commented they love The Homes for its extremely friendly atmosphere and healthy drinks. They find it friendly because of traditional values upheld by The Homes, and because they can feel a sense of belonging at the venue.  

SGT/VNN