Today we find ourselves in the sun drenched serene summertime courtyard of the Jamyang Buddhist Centre in Renfrew Road to check out their new café called ‘Kindness’. Frequent readers might recall that there was a previous café on their premises run by the brilliant Louie Louie, which managed to go bust shortly after we reviewed it. We accept no culpability in that outcome.
The Buddhist Centre occupies an old courthouse that once prosecuted the likes of the Kray twins and IRA terrorists. With that background it’s a glorious asymmetry that the building should now be sufficed with serenity, and for the first time in ages now mostly open to the public. After sticking our noses in rooms where people were meditating, an employee intervened/stopped us and offered a small tour. Still extant are the Victorian corridors and waiting rooms of the courts, with the primary room transformed into a Buddhist library which is open to the public. And most wonderfully the previous prison cells have been turned into Air BnB spaces! And as some of you’ve only witnessed a prison cell without really being given the option to leave, these feature original doors that you can open and close at times of your choosing.
Moving on to the Kindness café, it started appearing on our radar when a fan sent us the pic below of a customer with the most amazing hairstyle, which is already being copied by people here in the office. In August the café is open only at weekends and is a tranquil hideaway in an otherwise untranquil Greater Kennington. We enjoyed a rich, decadent carrot cake full of nuts and buttercream icing. Otherwise it’s a lunch venue serving affordable vegan/veg fare and for a good cause. But please don’t undertake the unkind pursuit of walking into a room of blissfully quiet meditators and blurting out ‘amazing, look at all the PERIOD FEATURES’, as it just becomes awkward.
