SINGAPORE: Even though lunch hour is a busy time at My Awesome Café on Telok Ayer Street, owner Franck Hardy still makes time to air-kiss and chat with regular customers and recommend specialities to newcomers while taking orders, serving food and leaning gracefully to flash his iPhone when presenting the bill to customers.

The well-built Frenchman turned Singapore permanent resident (PR) shed 8kg in the first fortnight of opening the café eight months ago.

And it wasn’t from pumping iron, he says, but from working from 7am to midnight almost every day.

The bohemian café with its vintage industrial vibe occupies the ground floor of a three-storey conservation shophouse that had once been a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) training centre.

The Chung Hwa Medical Institution was started by the Singapore Chinese Physicians’ Association to focus on research into TCM and provide training for Chinese physicians in TCM.

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The first Chung Hwa Free Clinic was established on the premises in 1952 to provide free TCM consultation to the poor and needy.

However, over time, as the CBD area evolved, shophouses in Telok Ayer became popular as office space, especially among creative agencies, private-equity fund managers and architects, as well as F&B outlets, salons and boutiques.

The number of TCM patients visiting the Telok Ayer clinic dwindled and it finally closed its doors in June 2005.

The Chung Hwa Medical Institution headquarters were relocated to Toa Payoh.

However, the building was gazetted by URA for conservation, given its historic significance, and the name on the building had to be preserved.

The shophouse in Telok Ayer was vacant for a time, and then leased to Sun Moon, a retailer selling fruits, juices and health food, for a few years.

Sun Moon has since moved to new premises across the street.

Julien Liu, managing director of De Five Rings Productions, a musical production and stage works design company, took over the master tenancy of the building on a six-year lease with an option to renew for another six years.

Liu had originally intended to turn the third level into a music studio, and was looking for a partner to operate the first two levels as an F&B outlet.

There was keen interest in operating the space as an F&B outlet, and Liu considered more than 100 applications, but turned down every one of them.

“Ultimately, in business, it’s more than just about making money,” he says.

“It’s about giving back to society.” For example, the rent from the shophouse in Telok Ayer is used to fund Chung Hwa Medical Institution’s provision of free TCM for the poor.

‘Bringing back the old Singapore’
It wasn’t long before S C Bong, digital partner at creative agency Mangham Gaxiola, happened to walk by the shophouse in Telok Ayer and saw Liu cleaning it.

He asked whether the unit was up for lease, as his creative agency was looking to move from Neil Road.

After some discussion, it was agreed that the creative agency would become a sub-tenant, taking up the two upper levels, while a tenant in the F&B business would take up the first level.

A property agent was engaged to find a suitable tenant.

However, Bong wanted to screen potential F&B operators, as, unlike most shophouses, where there is a separate entrance to the upper levels, the one at the Telok Ayer shophouse was through the first level.

“We didn’t want a bak kut teh shop or something like that, as the entrance to the agency is from the first level,” he explains.

As no suitable F&B operator could be found, Bong convinced his friend, Hardy, to set up a café there.

“When we saw the façade, we thought we could bring the old Singapore back to the shophouse,” says Hardy.

“I know Singapore is all about new buildings, but we wanted to preserve the rich history of the building, which is more than 60 years old, and find items that will capture the past.” He signed a five-year lease as a sub-tenant for the 1,800 sq ft space on the first level.

Hardy, Bong and a friend became owners of the café.

While Hardy and Bong were actively involved in setting up the café, their friend preferred to be a sleeping partner.

The name and logo of My Awesome Café was created by Bong.

“It’s partly because I use ‘awesome’ a lot, too much perhaps,” he confesses.

“And we wanted a name that can give the customers a sense of belonging.

We now have customers who come almost every day, and when they say, ‘Let’s go to My Awesome Café’, it gives them a sense of ownership.

It has become their café.” Bong also created a logo that represents east and west, “which isn’t easy to do when you’re working with Chinese characters”, he says.

Meanwhile, Hardy conceptualised the kitchen space and seating, as he would be involved in the day-to-day running of the café.

A former hotelier with a background in F&B, Hardy had arrived in Singapore nine years ago.

He was a former F&B director at the Swissôtel The Stamford and played a key role in starting up the St Regis Singapore, where he headed the F&B operations before becoming the general manager of Quincy Hotel at Mount Elizabeth.

He then spent three years as the general manager of One°15 Marina Club in Sentosa Cove.

It was while he was general manager of the Hotel Fort Canning that he was hit by the entrepreneurial bug and was persuaded by Bong to start the café.

They took two days to come up with the concept for the café and then drove around Singapore, stopping at places they didn’t typically visit, such as warehouses in Eunos, Kallang and Ubi.

A lot of the antiques and furniture in the café were accidental finds purchased from elderly men who are self-professed hoarders, says Bong.

For example, while driving past a warehouse one day, they saw old school chairs stacked outside.

Upon further enquiry, the owner of the warehouse, “an old uncle”, let them into the building and showed them his entire collection.

He even gave them free rein to wander around and pick out the things they wanted for their café.

Many of the antiques, school chairs, wall fans and school desks at the café came from that warehouse, says Hardy.

The pair even drove to Muar, Johor and to Melaka to hunt down vintage amber glassware and other items.

“We went to those mom-and-pop shops that hadn’t sold anything for the last 40 years, and [the proprietors] were elated when we bought vintage plates and glasses from them,” says Bong, the self-appointed negotiator.

It was in one of these glass shops that Hardy spotted an old wood-and-glass cabinet built by the shopowner and his wife in 1970.

They had used it as a filing cabinet and were more than happy to sell it to the pair for RM10.

It is now used as a display cabinet for the cakes and pastries in the café.

Besides the restored 1970s school desks in the café, there are a number of dining tables and high stools designed by Ah Keong, a contractor who specialises in fire protection pipe fittings and who did the piping for the café.

He fashioned the legs from pipes, and used old wooden doors and recycled teak for the tabletops and stool seats.

Against the odds
Renovation of the interior of the shophouse had started at almost the same time as the relic hunt.

New wiring, plumbing and flooring had to be installed, and even the walls had to be redone.

“When we took over the place, it was in pretty bad shape,” recalls Bong.

“To save costs, I became the project manager, and we went direct to the electrician, plumber and tiler.

It was an intense three months.”

While Bong was the project manager, Hardy was the runner who took care of the planning submissions for electricity and plumbing, and made sure all the necessary permits from the authorities were obtained.

“I’ve opened hotels and restaurants in the past, but as an F&B director, you have a whole team working for you,” says Hardy.

“For the first time, I was doing everything myself.” The entire renovation took three months, and costs, including furniture and accessories, totalled just under $200,000.

“If we had engaged an interior designer and architect, it would have cost us at least $500,000, but we did everything ourselves to save money,” says Hardy.

And the day he received the letter of approval from the National Environment Agency was the day the café opened: on Feb 6, at 6pm, which coincided with the seventh day of the Chinese New Year, traditionally known as ren ri, or everybody’s birthday.

In the CBD area, most F&B outlets cater to the office crowd, and few open on week nights, and even fewer on weekends.

But Hardy took the risk of opening until 11pm every night, and even on weekends.

“It was a gamble,” he admits.

“On Saturdays and Sundays, the CBD area is dead, but when you pass by My Awesome Café, it’s full.”

There is a growing trend of F&B outlets that cater for the lunchtime crowd in the day and serve as a watering hole for patrons who come after work.

My Awesome Café has become a popular all-day coffee meeting place.

While there are many interesting F&B concepts in the CBD, the number of conservation shophouses is limited to just 1,400 units, according to Colliers.

Rental rates for shophouses are still slightly lower than those for the ground floor of office buildings.

For example, in the Boat Quay area, the rental rates for eateries in shophouses, where the ambience is a blend of nostalgia and the modern, range from $8 to $12 psf per month, according to Colliers.

In the Tanjong Pagar neighbourhood, F&B outlets in shophouses pay between $9 and $12 psf per month in rent.

Rent and manpower are two of the biggest costs for F&B outlets.

As a master tenant of the three-storey shophouse, Liu is happy with the success of his new sub-tenants.

“The landlord’s initial worry was that [the café] couldn’t be sustained,” he concedes.

“Even I didn’t expect the café to do so well.”

‘Not a chef’s kitchen’
Hardy, who had put his entire savings into the business, recouped his investment within the first year.

“It is unusual in the F&B business,” he admits.

He reckons it’s because the menu is mainly salads and sandwiches.

And unlike most shophouses, where the kitchen takes up half the floor space, the one at Awesome Café occupies a small area, which means more space for customers.

“It’s not a chef’s kitchen,” he says.

“Most of my friends who are chefs think this is a horrible kitchen, but it works well for us.”

Even though the café has been operational for just eight months, the owners have already been approached by people asking if they are interested in opening more cafés in Hong Kong, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Penang and even London and Dubai.

“But we don’t want to expand so fast,” says Hardy.

“We want to pass the one-year mark before we think about growing.”

Over the years, many F&B outlets in the shophouses within the CBD have come and gone.

They close, and new ones sprout up to take their place.

“The most important is to get the concept right,” says Bong.

This article appeared in the City & Country of Issue 646 (Oct 6) of The Edge Singapore.

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