Despite what we all claim, deep down everyone wants to be a hipster. Let us show you the way. By Adam White, word hipster.
8-MIN READ8-MIN
The Music Hipster
This one’s easy. All you’ll need to begin is a pair of implausibly tight jeans, a premium subscription to Spotify ($48/month), and an “I’m listening to this new track super intently” nod. Now that you’ve mastered the basics, it’s time to turn you from lame-stream media magnet to indie music messiah.
1) First things first: you will need a ukulele. How can you possibly pretend to be a musical trendsetter if you’re not wandering around the streets of Mong Kok with a tiny Hawaiian guitar? Pick up a uke from Hong Kong Ukulele (Shop B2, 1/F, Block B, Friend’s House, 6 Carnarvon Rd., Tsim Sha Tsui, 2418-9355), where the walls are lined with ukuleles of all (diminutive) shapes and sizes. Don’t know how to play one? Not to worry: they’re ridiculously easy to pick up, and the shop offers free introductory lessons as well as more in-depth courses. They’re also very affordable: a basic uke starts at as little as $300.
Pedal to the metal at the Pedal Bunker
2) Of course, you obviously also play guitar. Upgrade your guitar wardrobe with a strap from VO (various locations, including Photato, Shop B1022, Miramar Shopping Centre, 132 Nathan Rd., Tsim Sha Tsui, 2376-2900; www.vo-vo-vo.com). These locally designed guitar and camera straps ($300-580) take inspiration from Aztec patterns for even more bang-on-trend style. After that, head to the Pedal Bunker (Room 701, 7/F, Knutsford Commercial Building, 4-5 Knutsford Terrace, Tsim Sha Tsui, 2369-1068), which stocks a vast and beautiful range of painstakingly sourced analog guitar pedals from all over the world (from $850), as well as amps made from vintage and recycled materials (from $9,500). Hope you know how to use them.
Craft tight beats at Slack Trax
3) No self-respecting hipster can expect to be strings-only these days. Nope: to be a true trendsetter, you’re going to have to learn to play all things electronic. If you can’t DJ and produce music, what separates you from Taylor Swift (aside from a gulf of talent and beauty)? Get yourself some DJ and production lessons at Slack Trax Studio (Shop 6D, 10/F Ka Ming Court, 688-690 Castle Peak Rd., Lai Chi Kok, slacktraxstudio.com, 8193-2007), headed up by international DJ Janette Slack. It’s $800 per hour for either one-on-one or two-on-one classes, so grab another aspiring hipster friend and split the cost. A package of 10 lessons is $6,000. Pretty soon you’ll be beat-matching like a pro, although you probably still won’t look like Taylor Swift.
4) Naturally, you’ll have to love vinyl. Hit up Paul Au of legendary record store Vinyl Hero (by appointment only, Flat D, 5/F, Wai Hong Building, 239 Cheung Sha Wan Rd., Sham Shui Po, 9841-7136), who was a hipster before you even knew the meaning of the word, and spend a day browsing his collection. Practice the following: “[Insert band name here]? Yeah, I liked their earlier stuff.”
Benky Chan perfects his visage
5) Time to actually listen to some music, hipster-in-training. Head to indie mecca Full Cup Café (36 Dundas St., Mong Kok, 2771-7775), whose stage is home to Hong Kong’s hippest new bands on Monday and Wednesday evenings, as well a super-chill session from 3-5pm Sunday afternoons. If you go now, you can tell everyone that you saw Hong Kong’s coolest bands before they got big. In the evening, go straight to Visage One (LG/F, Po Lung Building, 93 Hollywood Rd., Central, 2523-8988), Hong Kong’s most hipster (and only) barbershop-jazz-bar. Genres span jazz, classical, rock and anything else that owner/barber Benky Chan feels like throwing together. Hopefully all that uke practice paid off: it’s up to you now.
The Artisanal Food Hipster
So you like your yogurt Greek, your kale crispy, and your quinoa sustainable? Congratulations: you have the makings of an artisanal food hipster.
1) Can you truly call yourself artisanal if you don’t know how to knead your own sourdough? Certainly NOT. The Mixing Bowl (5 Shin Hing St., Sheung Wan, 2524-0001) will school you in all things baking with classes covering everything from muffins to madeleines, canelés to choux puffs. Prices start at $300 per person—and the pride you’ll feel while selling your own focaccia from a stall at the next Island East Markets (Sundays, Tong Chong Street, Quarry Bay, www.islandeastmarkets.org) makes it worth every single cent.
2) You know, you should really eat honey from bees that have been locally sourced. Visit Wing Wo Bee Farm (136 Pai Tau Village, Sha Tin, 2691-7917) to pick up some honey made by Hong Kong’s very own bees, which have been dining on Hong Kong’s homegrown pollen. Afterwards, hike up the hill to the Ten Thousand Buddhas Monastery just next door (220 Pai Tau Village, Sha Tin) and spread a spoonful of honey on that wheat germ loaf you baked this morning, as you peer down on Sha Tin. What’s that feeling deep down inside you? Yup, it’s sweet, sweet smugness. Doesn’t it feel good?
3) Got a rooftop space that’s going to waste? Good news, potential hipster—you can use it to grow your own kale! Check out Time To Grow (www.timetogrow.hk), which works to promote urban farming in Hong Kong. They run workshops and talks that teach people how to create their own rooftop farms, and sometimes even to work in smaller spaces.
Hubble, bubble with Brewcraft
4) Rhetorical question: Is there anything more hipster than brewing your own beer? Unnecessary answer: No. Learn how to become a master brewer with a three-hour homebrewing workshop with HK Brewcraft (4/F, Kwok Lun Commercial House, 15 Cochrane St., Central, 5925-2739). The lessons ($680 per person; $600 for groups of four or more) will turn you from a Fosters-swilling lout into a Kagua Rouge connoisseur in hours. Didn’t get that reference? There you go, then. Looks like you have some work to do.
Warning! The only thing that actually separates an artisanal food hipster from a “foodie” is an injudicious use of Instagram and #hashtags. Be very, very careful or you could jeopardize your new-found hipster cred.
The Crafty Hipster
If it’s not made in Hong Kong—or, better yet, made by your own two hands—it’s not your bag. From custom satchels to clothes or bikes, your gear is going to need that DIY vibe to make the cut.
1) What kind of a crafty hipster are you if you didn’t even make the leather satchel you’re slouching around Sheung Wan with? Take your hipster training into your own hands with the leather goods classes at Fungus Workshop (4 Po Hing Fong, Sheung Wan, 2779-9003. Watch our video here). They’ll take you through the whole process, from design to stitching to lining to finishing your leather product. Weekend workshops cost $1,680 for four sessions, and each session lasts two hours.
Mutt Museum: hot hipster alert
2) Making the old cool again? That’s right up your up-and-coming alley. Check out Janko Lam of Mutt Museum (Unit 202E, 2/F, InnoCentre, 72 Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon Tong, 9275-7059), whose denim qipao dresses blend old-school cool with modern fabrics. Hipster bro? Then go with Hola Classic (G/F, 17A Haven St., Causeway Bay, 2870-0245), which merges a tweedy aesthetic with modern cuts—going so far as to have an in-house made-to-measure tailor, with suits going for as little as $1,980.
It takes two to 2Stroke
3) You’ll never get that crafty-cool vibe down until you’re sitting pretty on a refurbished classic Vespa scooter from HK 2Stroke (Unit C2, 8/F, Phase 1, Kwun Tong Industrial Centre, 472-484 Kwun Tong Rd., Kwun Tong, 6019-1039). Head over and owner Chris Keith will help you customize your scooter until it’s trendier than a single-origin coffee shop full of fixed-gear bikes.
The Film Hipster
There’s a fine line between loafing movie marathoner and hipster film aficionado. For a quick fix, undergo the hipster movie makeover: don those nerdy glasses, tie back your flowing locks, and throw on the most androgynous clothing you own. Congrats! You’re well on your way to becoming the trendiest cinematic hipster this side of Bollywood.
They see me Rolleiflex
1) Time to get schooled in the history of Hong Kong cinema. The Hong Kong Film Archive (50 Lei King Rd., Sai Wan Ho, 2739-2139) is dedicated to preserving and screening the greatest (and some pretty crap) works of local film. Tickets average around $40, and the film archive regularly hosts talks and seminars with directors and luminaries after screenings. On this week: a retrospective of veteran Shaw Brothers director Griffin Yueh Feng.
Domo, Dave-san, I can't do that
2) Any true film hipster has a deep, abiding love of film memorabilia that goes beyond owning a “Clockwork Orange” T-shirt and the ability to endlessly quote “The Godfather.” Vintage and antique store In Between (6B Tai Ping Shan St., Sheung Wan, 9677-7815) stocks beautiful original film posters: everything from a Japanese poster of “2001: A Space Odyssey” to a German print for Charlie Chaplin’s “The Gold Rush.”
Classical Camera Shop: don’t snap at me
3) You’ll never be good at moving pictures until you can shoot a roll of film. Pick up a vintage snapper at Classical Camera Shop HK (Flat 17, 13/F, Cosmopolitan Centre, 760 Nathan Rd., Prince Edward, 2391-3130) which stocks a constantly changing range of vintage film cameras. Next stop: Sundance Film Festival, two years of shining fame, followed by a long career languishing in obscurity. That is, until the hipsters of the future rediscover you and make you cool again.
The Space Hipster
You are so over the earth. Everyone else already knows about that old rock. Time to move on to a new scene.
1) If you’re thinking about launching past the stratosphere, you’ll want to prep with a bit of airtime, so that you can say you were up there before anyone else. Ryze trampoline park (3/F, 321 Java Rd., Quarry Bay, 2337-8191) has what you’ll need, with 7,000 square feet of interconnected trampolines that will get you airborne, and feeling free of the earth’s gravitational pull. A bounce costs $150 per hour.
2) Don’t have your very own space shuttle yet? Go for the next-best thing with a flight simulator at Flight Experience (Shop 20, G/F, MegaBox, 38 Wang Chiu Rd., Kowloon Bay, 2359-0000). Their Boeing 737 sim allows you fly into Kai Tak airport, just meters from where the real planes once landed. Flight packages start at $1,290 for a half-hour flight, or $1,990 for an hour-long tour around several cities. There’s also room for two passengers, so your envious space-groupies can marvel at your skills.
Throwing some shade… IN SPACE
3) All astronauts have awesome sunglasses, because they are the coolest people in the entire world. Better head to Select-18 (Shop A, Grandview Garden, 18 Bridges St., Central, 9127-3657) to sort through the mountains of vintage shades. Because let’s be honest: no one’s going to take you seriously in space unless you’re rocking some totally fetch specs.
4) Want to master the trendiest galaxies? You’re going to have to educate yourself. Yes, the Hong Kong Space Museum (10 Salisbury Rd., Tsim Sha Tsui, 2721-0226) may be showing its age a little these days, but between the “Omnimax” planetarium show (from $24, still fun) and the fact that the gift shop sells freeze-dried astronaut ice cream, it’s still worth the trip.
5) To be a real space-faring futurenaut, you’ll need an equally futuristic watch—something like the Pebble smartwatch (from $1,298). It syncs with your phone to pass on notifications and allow you to set alarms, read messages, choose music, integrate with fitness apps, and more. It even tells the time. Visit the showroom (Shop 116, Tai Yau Plaza, 181 Johnston Rd., Wan Chai, 2891-2819) to check it out, although there’s no news on how well it will work in the trendy, icy vacuum of space.
The Accidental Chinese Hipster
Uh-oh. One day, you were just a little old granny, doing your thing. But all of a sudden, these young people started following you around, wearing the same plaid pajama pants you’ve worn for years and trying to post photos of you online. Is there any escape?
Mmm, a soothing bowl of… stop taking photos of my food!
1) Ah, what a lovely morning! Time for an early bite at Sang Kee (G/F, 7-9 Burd St., Sheung Wan, 2541-1099)—wait, what’s going on? What’s with this huge queue of youngsters? All you want is a bowl of crab congee and some yau za gwai dough sticks. Hrmph.
2) Well, while you’re in the area, might as well stock up on some underwear from trusty Lee Kung Man Knitting Factory (111 Wing Lok St., Sheung Wan, 2543 8579). The comfy cotton shirts and underwear are perfect for hot summer and chilly winters—wait, why is this store full of 20-somethings with moustaches in tight trousers? What is happening to this city?
The quiet, traditional Woo Ping Optical… stop taking my glasses! I need them to see! You’re not even short-sighted! (May Tse/SCMP)
3) Oh bother! Your reading glasses were accidentally smashed on the MTR by that young man who was playing on his iPhone. Better go replace them at Woo Ping Optical (278 King’s Rd., North Point, 2571-7810). Woo Ping has large thick frames that haven’t changed since you were a youngster yourself, and they’re cheap, too. What in heaven’s name is going on? What is this troupe of young people wearing plaid doing, pawing over the very pair you were going to purchase?
Australia Dairy Company’s eggs: co-opted by hipsters?
4) These young people are stealing all your favorite stores. Escape the island and go for a calming afternoon milk tea and some lovely rich scrambled eggs on toast at Australia Dairy Company (47-49 Parkes St., Jordan, 2730-1356). Oh, no! Yet another queue, full of young people playing on their phones! What is this “Open Rice” dish everyone wants? Where are they all going “Yardbird” watching? Why are they taking photos of your quilted jacket and striped trousers? Go away, hipsters!
