Garden cafés with standout design

A garden café is one where plants shape the room, not just decorate it. This guide collects cafés where that’s done well. Vertical in Istanbul is a food hall in a garden, with its own vertical farm, vines across the ceiling and beds for cats and dogs under the tables. Risu Café in Bangkok is built around a landscaped courtyard with a tree at its center, so daylight and green reach every floor. Hygge in Sheffield brings the garden indoors: a tree-sized plant under a timber-slatted ceiling, ferns hanging overhead and a curved bench backed by planters. Next on the list are two places in Copenhagen where the plants end up on the menu: noma’s greenhouse shop and coffee bar, and the restaurant on ØsterGRO’s rooftop farm.

The first cafés in this guide were chosen and photographed for their design by Andrew Chung, an architect and the founder of Best Cafe Designs. I edit this guide and add garden cafés I’ve visited myself, with my own photos. Each café is marked with who chose it. In October 2026 we rechecked addresses and hours. CoffeeHow hasn’t tasted the coffee at Andrew’s picks, so for those this is a guide to the spaces, not a coffee ranking.

Updated October 2026: rewritten as a growing design guide. We dropped Botanica in Constanța, Romania, because we couldn’t confirm what the first version said about it, removed the general sections on garden café culture and added my first café, Vertical in Istanbul, and my Copenhagen list.

I’ll admit it up front: I’m a fan of garden cafés. I collect beautiful ones filled with living plants. The best go a step further: the plants are grown and picked on site and end up in the cup or on the plate, and the café becomes part of a small ecosystem. Those are the places I look for when I travel, and I’ll add the ones I visit to this guide.

I live in Italy now, so Rome and the rest of the country come next. Until then, Copenhagen is at the top of my wishlist: it’s where this idea has been carried through most completely.

The cafés at a glance

Café	Where	The garden in a line	Picked by	Open
Vertical	Bağdat Avenue, Kadıköy, Istanbul	A garden food hall with a vertical farm, vines overhead and beds for animals under the tables	Me, visited	Check before you go
Risu Café	Ekkamai 12, Bangkok	A landscaped courtyard with a tree, overlooked by glass walls and a spiral stair	Andrew Chung	Not confirmed
Hygge	Fitzalan Square, Sheffield	An indoor garden: ferns overhead, planters, a tree-sized plant under timber slats	Andrew Chung	Mon–Fri 8:00–18:00, Sat–Sun 9:00–18:00
noma Projects	Refshaleøen, Copenhagen	A shop and coffee bar inside one of noma’s greenhouses	Me, not visited yet	Check nomaprojects.com
Gro Spiseri	Østerbro, Copenhagen	A greenhouse restaurant on a rooftop farm, using its herbs, flowers and honey	Me, not visited yet	Booking only

Andrew chose his cafés for their design: how plants are built into the plan, the materials around them and how much daylight they get. I pick beautiful cafés with living plants, especially ones where the plants are grown on site and used in the kitchen. Coffee quality wasn’t a criterion and the list isn’t ranked. Hours are as published in October 2026.

Vertical, Istanbul

Vertical is a food hall and garden on Bağdat Avenue, in an extension of the Boyner department store in Caddebostan, on the Asian side of Istanbul. Elif Boyner founded it, according to Posta, and its own vertical farm supplies part of the kitchen.

I’ve checked this one myself. On paper it’s a food hall, but it feels like sitting in a small park: olive trees stand right among the tables, climbing plants run along the mesh under the ceiling, and everything around is wood and the warm light of string lights.

The space is split by cuisine, which helps when everyone wants something different: a coffee bar with desserts and croissants, Neapolitan pizza and European dishes from Nappo, and a cocktail bar. I started with a cappuccino and moved on to an Aperol spritz.

The plants do a job here, too. In 2022 the vertical farm grew basil, sorrel, chard and kale, and the chef picked basil from the garden behind the kitchen for pesto, according to Posta. The same column says the kitchen produces almost no waste, used cooking oil is turned into soap and candles, and the garden furniture is built from construction pallets supplied by the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality.

What stayed with me most is how they treat animals. There are beds under the tables with water bowls beside them, and not only dogs use them: a tabby cat had settled on the bed under my table. The care goes beyond the plants. One wall is painted with Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and the service is built around creating as little waste as possible.

• Address: Bağdat Caddesi 319–321, Caddebostan, Kadıköy, Istanbul
• Hours: not published on a site of its own; it was still hosting events in January 2026, according to Plandy, so check a current listing before you go
• Animals: beds and water bowls under the garden tables
• Best for: anyone traveling with a dog, or even a cat, and groups where everyone wants something different: coffee and a croissant, pizza or a cocktail
• My visit: January 2023

Risu Café, Bangkok

Risu Café is a home, café and co-working space in one building on Ekkamai 12, a side street in central Bangkok. ForX Design Studio completed it in 2022, with Atta Pornsumalee as project architect, on 650 m² (about 7,000 sq ft), according to ArchDaily. The architects split it into a public café and social zone and a residential zone.

The courtyard is the center of the plan. Best Cafe Designs describes it as a landscaped courtyard that fills the interiors with natural light, according to Best Cafe Designs. In the photo, a tree rises from a low lawn of ferns and cycads, the ground floor opens onto it through tall timber-framed glass, and a black spiral staircase climbs to a terrace above. You see the garden from almost any seat, which is the point.

• Address: 119 Ekkamai 12 Alley, Khlong Tan Nuea, Watthana, Bangkok 10110
• Designed by: ForX Design Studio (2022)
• Hours: not published; check Google Maps before you go
• Status: we couldn’t confirm in October 2026 that it’s still open
• Chosen by: Andrew Chung, Best Cafe Designs

Hygge, Sheffield

Hygge is a Danish-inspired café on Fitzalan Square in Sheffield city center. Alex Moore and his wife opened it in late 2019, just before the pandemic, according to The Star. It has since grown to three cafés around Sheffield and one in Leeds, which opened in October 2025, the Yorkshire Post reported.

It isn’t a garden café in the outdoor sense: the garden is indoors. A tree-sized plant stands over a round table built on a barrel, under a ceiling of pale timber slats. In the back room, a curved slatted bench wraps around low rattan tables, with potted palms and ferns in woven baskets along its top. Ferns and trailing plants hang from the ceiling between globe bulbs, and a mural of leaves covers the far wall.

• Address: 14 Fitzalan Square, Sheffield S1 2AZ, United Kingdom
• Hours: Monday to Friday, 8:00 to 18:00; Saturday and Sunday, 9:00 to 18:00 (as of October 2026, per Yorkshire.com)
• Payment: card and phone only, no cash
• Also at: two more cafés in Sheffield and one in Leeds
• Chosen by: Andrew Chung, Best Cafe Designs

On my list: Copenhagen

I haven’t been to these two yet. They’re here because the plants are grown on site or worked into what you eat and drink. When I visit, each one gets my own photos and notes.

noma Projects, Refshaleøen

noma Projects is the restaurant noma’s shop for home cooks, set up in 2022 to share what its test kitchen and fermentation lab make. Its garums and vinegars are made in Copenhagen by noma’s chefs and fermentation lab, according to noma Projects. The shop sits in one of noma’s greenhouses at the restaurant on Refshaleøen, according to VisitCopenhagen.

The coffee bar pours Noma Kaffe. noma has roasted the beans it brews for guests in Copenhagen since 2024, and its team travels to origin to meet producers, according to noma. Here the plants aren’t a backdrop: they’re the raw material for the flavors on the shelves.

• Address: Refshalevej 96, 1432 Copenhagen
• Hours: closed Monday and Tuesday in winter, per VisitCopenhagen; check nomaprojects.com before you go
• My visit: not yet

Gro Spiseri on ØsterGRO, Østerbro

ØsterGRO is Denmark’s first rooftop farm: 600 m² (about 6,500 sq ft) on a building on Æbeløgade in Østerbro, founded in 2014, with rabbits, chickens and bees as well as vegetable beds, according to the Danish Architecture Center. It runs as community supported agriculture: members pay before the season and collect a share of the harvest. In 2023 it had about 40 members, VerticalFarmDaily reported.

Gro Spiseri is the restaurant in the farm’s rooftop greenhouse, open all year with long communal tables. It cooks with produce from local organic farmers and uses herbs, flowers and honey from the farm, according to Gro Spiseri.

• Address: Æbeløgade 4, 2100 Copenhagen Ø
• Booking: required; Gro Spiseri’s website lists two different sets of hours, so check when you book
• My visit: not yet

Garden cafés FAQ

Sources

• Posta: Şehirde sürdürülebilir restoran kültürü, hasattan anında masaya (Rukzan Sağır, November 2022)
• Hürriyet: Dikey tarladan sofraya (Onur Baştürk, October 2021)
• Plandy: workshop at Vertical, January 2026
• Best Cafe Designs: Andrew Chung’s picks and photos, Risu Café and Hygge
• ArchDaily: Risu Café / ForX Design Studio (June 2022)
• The Star: everything you need to know about Hygge Cafe
• Yorkshire Post: Hygge Leeds, a first look (October 2025)
• Yorkshire.com: HYGGE Fitzalan Square (hours and payment)
• noma Projects: FAQ; noma: Noma Kaffe is here; VisitCopenhagen: noma Projects shop
• Danish Architecture Center: ØsterGRO, rooftop farm above the concrete
• VerticalFarmDaily: urban farming in Copenhagen grows relationships in the city (2023)
• Gro Spiseri

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Published March 14, 2024 · Last updated October 28, 2026