Meow Parlour Review| Firestar & Company

Hey guys! Firestar here! Welcome back to the blog! Today, I am going to be doing a review on Meow Parlour, which is a cat cafe located in New York City. There are many rules, but it's totally worth it if you're a cat lover like me! I will be covering the history, rules, my experiences, and other stuff in this review! So, let's get started! I have to warn you though, this review is going to be very picture-heavy. Just throwing that out there.

First, some historical context/background about cat cafes! The concept originated in Taipei, Taiwan, with the opening of the first cafe, known as "Cat Flower Garden" or 貓花園 if you live in Taiwan/can read Mandarin Chinese. This eventually became a tourist destination for people from all over the world, most notably Japan. Although these cafes originated in Taiwan, Japan usually takes the credit due to the fact that cat cafes blossomed there, and that there are many cafes in Tokyo. Here, the first cafe was the "Cat's Store" or 猫の店 if you live in Japan/can read Japanese Kanji. Since this opened, cat cafes have become a phenomenon everywhere. There is one in Singapore, "Garden of Cat", and the first cafe opened in North America was the "Cat Cafe Montreal (Le Café des Chats)" in Canada. There are many cafes around the world, so naming all of them here would get boring, so I suggest you do some research for yourself.

Citation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_café 

Next, at this particular cafe, there were many rules to go by, for safety reasons:

1. Children 10 and under should only go during the designated time slots, as they can not accommodate children outside of the slot.

2. DON'T bring any of your own cats to the place.

3. If you have allergies, they WON'T supply medication, but there is a pharmacy nearby.

4. In an emergency, alert a staff member immediately.

5. They AREN'T liable for anything that happens as a result of interacting with the cats, as they can't control the cats' behaviors. 

6. All guests should sanitize hands and remove shoes at the entrance. Sanitization for obvious reasons, and shoe removal because it helps keep the place clean, and it is a tradition in Japan*. Even the staff don't have shoes on.

7. No pulling on a cats tail.

8. No flash photography, but regular photography is fine.

9. No picking up any of the cats unless you consulted with a staff member.

10. No climbing on the shelves or opening up any furniture. There are reserved places to sit.

11. Toys are available at the front desk, and must be returned upon exit.

12. Don't give human food/drinks to cats. Any drink is fine, as long as it has a lid, no food is allowed for the safety of the cats, but they have a separate bakery where any food from there is allowed because they can guarantee that the ingredients aren't toxic to the cats. If you are not sure, It would be better to just get drinks from their bakery.

13. You can gently pet sleeping cats, but don't wake them to play.

14. Don't give any food or treats to the cats. Their cats are on specific diets that they don't want messed up. Also, they won't modify the cats behaviors to play with a visitor with treats.

15. Cats wearing collars are new to the facility, as all the cats in the cafe are shelter cats. 

16. Have fun! (OK, that's not actually on the website, but I added it just because)

Reminders:

You have to sign a waiver upon entry.

If you are with a minor, an authorized individual must sign on their behalf.

Source: I literally just copied off the website and paraphrased some of them.

Here is the link to the website if you want to read the original: Meow Parlour Rules

*Taking off shoes in Japan is very common. For example: going to a person's house, in the school building, and other places like these. They want to keep the place clean. I suggest you bring socks with you to the cafe. Unless you want to go barefoot, which is also fine. All the staff members do it, but I wouldn't recommend it just because.

      

So, now let's get into my actual experiences. 

First, they have their own bakery, where you can go either before or after your appointment. Or you can go if you are a parent or adult that just accompanied your kids into the city. In the bakery, there are many snacks. For example, cat shaped cookies, cat shaped macarons, and some things that aren't cat shaped. There is also a selection of fizzy soda-like drinks that are made from real cane sugar and are created in New York City. I went with a friend of mine, as well as my mom. I got the Chocolate Kitty and Party Kitty cat shaped macarons, and my friend got a cat shaped Oreo cookie, and also the Party Kitty. My mom only got a regular chocolate chip cookie. Me and my friend got the cola soda, and my mom got a regular iced tea and a seltzer.

Here is the Party Kitty macaron. I kind of forgot I needed to do a review, so I ate the other one and the ear of of this one. :) They were both really good, so I totally recommend you get them. 

Here is what the soda looked like. Oh, and that's my mom's seltzer and iced tea in the background. The soda tasted good, but a little bit sweeter than the regular Coca-Cola, which this is supposed be like. I actually didn't finish mine because it was too sweet, but my friend finished it so it was OK. My mom liked her seltzer, but she didn't like her iced tea much. She doesn't really drink iced tea, so take that into consideration. 

Also in the bakery, there were many decorations (cat themed of course) and they had all of their snacks and drinks on display.The interior was pretty pleasant. Like something you would see in a usual cafe/bakery, except with more cats. 

This was one of the walls. It had their social media (links at the end), some pictures, and some of the merchandise they offer.

Here is most of their display. There was someone at the counter, so I couldn't get the whole display. I got the most important part though. As you can see, they display all of their treats in these display cases. The sodas are above the display, but I couldn't include them for the same reason as stated above. If that person wasn't there at the time, I would've taken a picture of their whole display. 

  One of the decorations on their walls. It's an outline of a cat. Nothing more, nothing less.

Here is what the tables/chairs looked like. The whole place is painted in a pastel teal/aqua color, with white walls, so the tables/chairs blended nicely. 

That about does it for the bakery. Now onto the cafe. 

Here is the check in window. There are drawings of all the cats that are there or have been there in the past*. They have an iPad where when you sign in, you need to give all your info and sign the waiver. There will be an attendant there to greet you. There is a smaller window on the left of this picture that opens and closes, just to let you know. 

 Here is a cat that was sleeping in a corner in between the entrance and the sign that is seen from the street. If I'm not mistaken, this is a brown Tabby cat. 

This cat was sleeping on a pillow near the sitting area  near the entrance. As you can see, there is a cat shaped cylindrical decoration near the pillow. 

Here is a cat that was laying on a chair/bed near the merchandise area, which you can also store your purse in.

 This is their merchandise rack. They have more merchandise, as stated above. They have a whole hanging rack full of stuff as well as this.

This is what the main desk looks like from the inside. They have even more merchandise hanging up, and on the desk. This is also where you keep your shoes when you enter.In the far left bottom corner (if you can see it), there are a bunch of pairs of shoes. They are kept in a cubby-hole like area on the outside of the desk.

  These two cats were facing off in the middle of the hallway leading to the entrance.

This is me next to a cat who prefers a cardboard box over a comfy bed. Many of the cats there were running around and playing, so I'm surprised that this cat stayed put for the picture. I tried to get it to look at the camera, to no avail. :)

Here is a cat who was sitting on a pillow while playing with a toy. This is the same cat as the one in the picture above ^^^. :)

On the very back wall of the cafe, there was a setup similar to the one shown in this picture. It made up the majority of the back wall, and there were benches attached where people could sit. This cat slept the whole time I was there. I guess it was really tired. :)

 This cat tried to get into the room that said "no cats". There was also a very low couch on the adjacent wall. 

Here is my friend playing with a cat. This was the same cat as the one in the earlier picture of me next to it in a cardboard box. 

This cat was sitting on top of the glass cylinder with a bed inside. :) They had about 3 of these cylinders. 

These cats were fighting when one ran into this hiding hole. This is one of the benches that can be sat on. There is also another one of those cylinders in this picture.

Here is a cat around one of the staff members. That is one of their litter boxes on the far left. This is another one of the benches that can be sat on.

Cats love Glory! Oh, wait, I wasn't supposed to reveal her name online. Apologies to her. Just kidding, she's perfectly fine with it. This is a cat who jumped up onto the desk and tried to jump on her.

Before we left, this cat wanted the grapes that were in our bag. Unless it was just curious. :)

Also before we left, this cat was enjoying Glory's attention. That is a cat shaped pillow it was standing on, On the far right is the window. 

*This cafe also acts as a shelter, so people can adopt from here, but need to sign some things and pay. I don't really know much about it, so check out their website for more info if you are interested.

Overall, I really enjoyed the experience. Especially since I am going to Tokyo in April 2017 possibly with the same friend shown here.  Glory also really enjoyed it, as did my mom. Both of us own cats ourselves, so we enjoyed this place even more. The staff members were nice, and the cats seemed like they were treated very well. My only complaint is that the place was hard to find because there is scaffolding over it, and the bakery was in a different location than the cafe. It wasn't very far, but still, the two should really be in the same building.

Overall: 5/5
I recommend you go when you get the chance. You have to make reservations online, but they allow walk-ins sometimes. Glory was a walk-in, I originally was only supposed to go with my mom but then Glory's mom texted me and said that she was available for the day, so we decided to bring her with us and figure out how to get everyone in. They only allow walk-ins occasionally, mostly when they're not full. This brings me to my next complaint. There are time frames, and people who made the reservation online only get half an hour in the cafe, but walk-ins get a full hour in the cafe. I think they should really change that to be the opposite. Reservations get one full hour, and walk-ins get half an hour. 

That about raps up this review. I hope you enjoyed! If you have any suggestions for future reviews, contact me, or send me a message. Don't forget to visit Meow Parlour at http://www.meowparlour.com, and follow them on their Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. I'll see you in the next review!
~Firestar & Co.