Shopping Guide
While this is, in many ways, just like a normal cafe, all of the female waitstaff are dressed in school swimsuits. They look like they're ready for swim class to start, and yet they bring you pasta, make onigiri rice balls for you, and pose for pictures with you. This fantasy-come-true School Swimsuit Cafe just opened for a limited time in Tokyo's Akihabara, so we decided to check it out right away.
The School Swimsuit Cafe is a collaboration with the film Sweet Poolside, which opens in theatres on June 14. The cafe will be open for four days only, on June 8th, 15th, 22nd, and 29th in the cosplay cafe and bar, Meteor Shower. The entire concept is based on the film, with swimsuit-wearing staff serving collaborative menu items.
**Meteor Shower has been transformed into the School Swimsuit Cafe for four days only.**
Sweet Poolside is a live-action adaptation of a manga series of the same name by Shuzo Oshimi, who is known for such series as The Flowers of Evil. It takes place in a high school swim club. Freshman boy Toshihiko Ota is self-conscious about his womanly, smooth, and hairless legs. On the other hand, freshman girl Ayako Koto has so much body hair that she wears long sleeves even in the middle of summer. Once these two meet, they build an intimate relationship.
So the entire cafe is based on the concept of a pool, which is why the waitstaff bring you food in swimsuits. Collaborations forever! There are five school swimsuit girls on the waitstaff in total, including Yuho, the manager. However, the same girls will not be there every day. Over the four days which the cafe is open, new girls will switch places with the old ones.
The swimsuits they wear are just like the one worn by Koto in the movie, a plain Arena brand competition swimsuit. The day we went, three girls were in navy blue, and two were in light blue suits, each with an air of modesty and cleanliness. They complained a bit with each other about the swimsuits saying, "There's a white tag on the back that I can't take off. Even though it's distracting..."
Don't worry, you’re still...*gulp*...dazzling.
**Tama Himeno, who is currently a college student, was thoughtful enough to wear her own indoor school shoes. Thank you so much!**
The collaboration menu that the servers bring to you with their fair-skinned arms, is quite impressive. The mentaiko pasta dish, called "Bristly Pasta" (1,200 yen), has pieces of dried seaweed on top, thinly sliced to resemble leg hair. There's a dessert called "Sweet Pool Juice" which uses soft ice cream made to look like shaving cream (1,200 yen, includes a photo of one if the swimsuit girls in their normal clothes). The whole menu contains nothing but items like these based in the theme of body hair.
**“Bristly Pasta” (left) and a cucumber and kombu appetizer (right). The kombu is also meant to be a hairy motif.**
**This “Sweet Pool Juice” is a ginger ale and blue Hawaii mixed cocktail with a dollop of "shaving cream" soft ice cream. It was brought to us by Una, who also works as a voice actress.**
**When you order the “Sweet Pool Juice” you can get a Polaroid picture of one of the girls in their regular clothes chosen at random. Mappu Nagase, a member of a comedy troupe, holds up the box with the pictures inside.**
Another important concept of the cafe is shaving. It’s an important theme in the manga series and film as well. In the story, Ota comes across Koto one day as she is secretly trying to shave her arm hair. Koto reveals all of her hair worries to Ota before asking him abruptly, “Will you shave my hair?” From then on he helps Koto shave her body hair. It starts with the arms, and then to the shins and from there…it escalates. Ota then begins to harbor some special feelings toward Ayako and shaving.
The excitement that Ota gets when shaving Koto comes through in the service by the swimsuit girl staff, and the hair-related menu items.
We asked college student Manami Ito to press a School Swimsuit Onigiri (700 yen) for us at our table into the shape of our choosing. She squeezes the 350 grams of hot rice wrapped in plastic wrap while, of course, wearing a school swimsuit.
“Is this the first time you’ve made an onigiri in a swimsuit?”
“Yes. [laughs]”
“What’s it like waiting on customers like this?”
“…It’s a bit embarrassing.”
We cut open the round onigiri to once again encounter a hairy motif on the inside: sliced kombu. Looking inside the store again, we see bikini lines, bare arms and legs everywhere… Aaah! it’s too much to handle!!! Just the school swimsuits are enough, but when paired with the various themes from the story, like shaving, it reaches a completely new level of eroticism.
For 1,000 yen you can take a photo with one of the staff. Come experience the unique atmosphere of being in a cafe with waitresses in swimsuits. Or make full use of your imagination and artificially experience the hairless eroticism of Sweet Poolside. Whatever you’re looking for, the special kind of excitement that you get at School Swimsuit Cafe will surely help you get over the damp and dreariness of the rainy season.
Source: Netolabo
Source article written by Takahiro Kuroki
Writer Profile:
Takahiro Kuroki
Born in 1988. Freelance writer from Kagoshima Prefecture. Mainly writes about manga, Japanese festivals and traditions for the news site Netolabo. Interests include tribal masks, Japanese dance culture and Rock ‘n’ Roll.
Twitter Account: https://twitter.com/abbey_road9696
* This article, including all photographs, was republished with permission from Netolabo.
* The image quality for a portion of the pictures may be low. Those wanting to see the pictures in high resolution, please visit the source link.