Fujin Street, an enchanting 800-meter-long road in Taipei’s Minsheng Community, offers visitors a tranquil getaway from the city’s hustle and bustle—largely thanks to the luxuriant trees that shade the street and isolate the area from noisy Dunhua North Road.
The neighborhood is reminiscent of southern France or New York’s SoHo district, with designer studios, posh cafes and stylish home decor shops. Yet these businesses, mostly on the first floor, are all well-camouflaged with beautiful gardens or fences that make them just another ordinary part of the residential area. It is a perfect place for a leisurely afternoon walk exploring the treasures to be found.
Hitomi Hosoki, editor-in-chief of Taipei Navi, a website introducing Taiwan’s tourism and dining, said Fujin Street has grown in popularity with Japanese tourists for its unique combination of artistic boutiques and designer coffee shops that resemble those in Tokyo’s Daikanyama and Jiyugaoka areas.
The facade of Petite Provence, for example, is adorned with potted plants and warm lighting. Inside is a home decor store that sells ceramics, candles, scents, fabrics, furniture and tableware from southern France and Italy, offering endless inspiration and authentic French provincial decor ideas.
“French country interior decoration is relaxed, warm and subtly elegant,” store owner Vicky Hung told Taiwan Today in a recent interview. “It is all about the fluidity of boundaries between different parts of the home, and creative use of ornaments and textiles.”
Hung, 33, said she fell in love with French country decoration while traveling in southern France and decided to open the store in April to make quality products available to local consumers without their having to break the bank.
The store can be defined as a proponent of modern French country style. Nearly every product is made of natural materials such as flax fabric, iron and wood, Hung said, adding that the handmade details and wrought finish on furniture and porcelain ware can easily lend a French air to any space.
“The subtleness and elegant color of French country decoration works perfectly for urban families with limited living space,” Hung said. “Start with little things such as dried flowers, a wooden ornament, something gilded or decorative fabric like ‘toile de Jouy’ to deliver the French touch to a room.”
For an informal yet graceful dining experience, she suggested hand-painted earthenware of the sort families in Provence would use for a casual Sunday brunch.
Doorways are another key place that must not missed out in creating a convincing French country look, Hung said. Hand-carved wood panels or architectural plaster fragments such as acanthus and corbel can make perfect doorway jewelry, she added.
According to Hung, the store updates its collection every six to 10 weeks with the latest collections from home interior brands such as Andrea Brugi, Blanc d’Ivoire, Charvet, Libeco and Marinette St. Tropez. These products are priced at 1.2 times more than retail prices in Europe, which Hung said is very reasonable since no taxes or shipment fees are required.
“I want to make the elegant and leisurely lifestyle of Provence affordable to everyone.”
Just down the street from Petite Provence is Funfuntown, which lives up to its name as a creative home decor shop where customers can indulge their childlike qualities.
“People of all ages find this an ideal place for treasure hunting with a perfect mix-and-match of new and old,” said store manager Rong Lo.
Founded by a couple working in advertising, Funfuntown was originally known for selling designer lamps such as the French industrial icon Jielde lamps by Jean-Louis Domecq and the creative do-it-yourself Garland Light by Studio Tord Boontje for Artecnica. The store’s collection has been expanded to a variety of contemporary and vintage furniture, enamelware and handmade ornaments.
“Many of the products were personally collected by the owners, who spent a lot of time looking for antiques in flea markets around the world,” Lo said. “Most items are one of a kind but all together they represent the spirit of home, where people only bring back things they love.”
Inventiveness is everywhere to be seen at Funfuntown, for instance in vintage Edison bulbs, which Lo said can be combined with a dictionary or porcelain pot to create a new look.
Buyers of the Garland Light can shape it into any form by wrapping the continuous metal strand of delicately etched floral patterns around a light bulb, he added.
“We hope our customers find something that makes their lives more beautiful,” Lo said.
Besides interesting boutiques, Fujin Street is also known for its coffee shops, perfect for a teatime break. Sonnentor Cafe, for example, is one of the most popular, due to its thorough implementation of green practices, from store design down to the meals it offers.
As a subsidiary of Recome Co. Ltd., the cafe sports an artistic yet inviting decor with an in-house bookstore and grocery, as well as an art gallery and exhibition space displaying works by Taiwan’s emerging artists.
Its menu is designed to offer a healthy dining experience, using only fresh and quality ingredients grown locally. From homemade bread and pastries, organic pasta and natural pork to fair trade coffee, the cafe is one with a conscience.
“Our motto is ‘You are what you eat!’” said General Manager Orton Huang. “We believe there are no shortcuts to a healthy diet and everyone should eat only foods that are minimally processed with no artificial ingredients, coloring or chemical preservatives.”
The store uses natural yeast instead of baking powder to make bread, and spends eight hours a day cooking apple syrup for its desserts, according to Huang, who noted that these practices are in line with the farm-to-table concept and the spirit of the slow food movement.
“It is not an easy thing when it comes to creating a healthy diet, and we should not take it for granted,” he said.
The cafe is also known for art activities ranging from sculpture and oil painting exhibitions to face-to-face talks with artists. Huang doubles as the curator, selecting contemporary art that inspires him.
One of the most recent exhibitions was “A Secret Dream” by Chou Chin-ting, featuring colorful paintings on transparent plastic plates. Her work features fairy tale creatures such as unicorns and whales, which are metaphors for members of her family, narrating stories of her personal life in a serene fashion.
Passersby might easily mistake Cafe Showroom, with its minimalist decor, for an art gallery, designer studio or furniture store.
Manager Jamie Chung, 27, told Taiwan Today that she and partner Katherine Lin opened the coffee shop last November to create a relaxing space that could narrow the distance between art and the general public.
“Art should not be intimidating; it ought to be accessible to everyone,” said Chung, who has a degree in art and museum management.
The placid, green neighborhood of Fujin Street fits their approach perfectly, Chung said, adding that her store attracts many local residents, as well as architects and designers.
The entire cafe is one large open space, with the serving area in the front and a showroom in the rear. Black and white are the only colors used throughout the cafe, to give precedence to the artwork, Chung said.
She added that previous exhibitions have included young and avant-garde artists from Taiwan, Hong Kong and the U.K. such as photographer Wang Wanyu, and they are planning to organize tea parties next year for artists to share their stories.
“It is always such an encouragement for us to receive positive feedback on our exhibitions,” Chung said. “It feels even better when customers decide to take one of the paintings home with them—not because of its monetary value but for the simple love of art.” (THN)
Write to Rachel Chan at ccchan@mofa.gov.tw