---
title: Toraya Karyo Kyoto Ichijo
url: https://karigurashijourney.com/en/notes/toraya-karyo-kyoto-ichijo/
lang: en
journey: https://karigurashijourney.com/en/episodes/kyoto-machiya/
---

# Toraya Karyo Kyoto Ichijo

Places we stopped along the way　/　Kyoto City, Kyoto

Toraya's tearoom in Kyoto, the city where the confectioner was founded. Renovated in 2009 to a design by architect Hiroshi Naito, it has a ceiling of Yoshino cedar that curves in a gentle arch. The garden on the north side has a water basin, a lawn, plum and cherry trees, and an old storehouse and a small Inari shrine at the back. The seasonal sweets change twice a month; this time I had a three-colored sweet, a white bun and matcha.

400 Hirohashidono-cho, Ichijo-dori Karasuma Nishi-iru, Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto

## This moment in the journey: Tea time, looking out on the garden

In the afternoon I went from the banks of the Shirakawa up to Kamigyo. A townhouse with a blue noren curtain, a red lantern beside a purple noren, white plum blossoms just opening on a mossy branch: the end of winter in Kyoto.

My destination was Toraya Karyo Kyoto Ichijo, near Karasuma-Ichijo, the tearoom of the confectioner Toraya in the city where it was founded. Under a cedar ceiling that curves in a gentle arch, I took a seat looking out through the glass onto the garden.

On a black tray came a seasonal sweet layered in yellow, white and pink, a white bun stamped with a pink mark, and a bowl of freshly whisked matcha. Tea time, looking out on a garden, the Kyoto way. On the table stood pink chrysanthemums. A slow afternoon. A happy hour.

![A three-colored sweet, a white bun and matcha on a black tray](https://karigurashijourney.com/img/kyoto-machiya/s47-1200.jpg)
- Sources: https://rurubu.jp/andmore/article/19673

Read this scene in the full journey: https://karigurashijourney.com/en/episodes/kyoto-machiya/