Hong Kong Collectors: Halfway Coffee’s Nostalgic Crockery

Man Mo Temple is being renovated: the eastern half of the historic compound on Hollywood Road is currently encased in scaffolding and protective mesh. Just opposite and down some steps is the start of Cat Street – or Upper Lascar Row to give it its proper title. A pedestrian alley replete with curio shops and stalls selling ceramic mugs and teapots, blue ceramic lion door stops, tables with piles of sepia-toned posters of 1930s Shanghai cheongsam-ed women, Bruce Lee and Mao memorabilia, and old photographs of low-flying aircraft over Mongkok as they readied for the landing at Kai Tak.

On the right side of the steps is an old man with a white beard telling fortunes to two young seated women, with his long-practiced hands painting black calligraphy on strips of red paper, and laminated weather-proof newspaper articles stuck to the wall behind him extolling his experience. Turn to the left and walk pastway the jade and turquoise beads, and a furniture shop, and you’ll find customers sat outside on a mix of stools and wooden chairs. This is Halfway Coffee, where no one piece of furniture is the same as the next, and china cups and saucers and glasses with painted flowers have a character all of their own.

Tommy Chui is the 34-year-old owner and boss of Halfway Coffee. He orders a round of coffees for our group: a blend of beans from Indonesia, Ethiopia, Colombia, and Brazil. We sit around a small hexagonal table with inlaid wood as Chui explains how it came from an expatriate’s house. He enjoys collecting stools and Hong Kong-designed office chairs, and each of his five Halfway Coffee outlets throughout Hong Kong have their own sets of crockery and glasses that he’s gradually gathered from several sources. He has recommendations on shops that specialise in second-hand objects, or if he wants new but traditional designs, he is a fan of the Yuet Chung China Works wholesalers in Kowloon Bay, where the last of the master painters sit bent over a plate, saucer or vase and with fine brushes paint on the blue and white or multicoloured designs. 

But what makes Chui’s nostalgic collection of cups and saucers particularly endearing is that the majority has been bought in the early morning or evenings in Mongkok or Sham Shui Po from old ladies who put down blankets and then lay out assorted items to sell from their homes. “You have to go early,” Chui explains. “And it’s a bit hit and miss. It might also depend on the weather. But usually it’s between 5:30am and 7am in Mongkok, and then in the evening in Sham Shui Po.  But they’re not always selling cups and glasses, of course, so I go back often to check what they’re selling. Sometimes the old ladies are out early in the mornings because they’re awake and can’t fall back to sleep in their subdivided accommodation.”

Next to the café in Cat Street is a small private museum with glass-fronted cupboards, all different, often bought and transported from New Territories houses. Stacked inside those cupboards are sets of cups and saucers dating from the 1950s to the 1990s. It’s not archived — there are no labels — but Chui welcomes visitors to sit on a Hong Kong-designed and manufactured red or green office chair and have a chat. He can give a rough date and style and a story of where he got the items from. “Ideally, I want to create a database as there are more than 4,000 items, but I don’t have the time at the moment,” he says. 

Elderly and middle aged visitors sit and remember when they last used those tall glasses that line the shelves; they are painted with bright naïve flowers, or brown graded stripes from the 1980s, or animals or spots. Most are from Hong Kong, some from Japan. Just 30 years ago, those ubiquitous glasses would have been on every public housing kitchen table.

“I love when people come in and share their stories. I enjoy that communication – of when they were children and remember using cups like these,” says Chui. “But young people come in and they don’t really talk, this generation doesn’t communicate in the same way which is a shame, as it is good to share these experiences.”

The sets of bright red and yellow ceramic cups and saucers are very Instagrammable, but that’s not what Chui is interested in. “I like to investigate Hong Kong culture through collecting old things and also to connect with different kinds of people,” he says. He goes back inside and reappears with a package covered in old Chinese newspaper. Inside is a set of cups and saucers that he bought from one of the old women on the street, but he’s kept it in the old newspaper, tied with string. 

“This was bought from an old lady in Jordan for just HK$48 and I’ve kept it in the original packaging,” he says. “I went back later to buy some more, but she had died. I love this traditional wrapping, protecting the cup handles.  Sometimes you come across these sets in newspaper and they were brought by people from the mainland in the 50s and 60s, kept in storage and never unwrapped. So it’s interesting also to read the stories on the old newspaper.” 

Each branch of Halfway Coffee is intentionally located in older buildings – developers have wanted him to set up in shopping malls, he says, but that’s the wrong model for him. He’s keen for café customers to enjoy his cups and glasses and he moves the different designs around the five locations. “I don’t want it like art on walls in a museum, I want people to use it every day and if something breaks, well that’s fine, it happens,” he says.

Chui has made long-lasting friendships through his multiple trips to the old hawkers of Sham Shui Po and Mongkok. And sometimes when he has too many of one item, or a set that is the wrong size for the cafés, he gives it to the women for them to resell. He doesn’t sell any of his collection but is happy to direct visitors on where they too can start their own.

In the middle of the museum area is an incongruous small collection of old-style Land Rover models. “I just like Land Rovers,” he laughs; he owns the real thing too. “Sometimes when I’m driving around I’ll see furniture outside [on the street] that I like so I sometimes go back, offer a price and see if they’re willing to sell.”

It’s been a bit of a life journey for Chui find what suits him best as an entrepreneur and collector. In 2006, he studied at the Chinese Culinary Institute in Pok Fu Lam, becoming proficient in Beijing and Cantonese dishes. But his heart wasn’t in it and he admits to skipping classes and heading to Macau to gamble. “Any kind, mahjong, poker,” he says. After training he worked at Petrus in the Shangri-La hotel. “There was a fireworks event and I had to lay a table for a hundred guests and then I was able to watch the fireworks. It’s a wonderful memory.” But he broke his leg in a football match and his surgery and recovery was a months-long process. Working in steam filled kitchens in rubber boots was not ideal, so he switched to becoming a barista before setting up the first Halfway Coffee eight years ago. It was in an old, blue building just down the way from the Cat Street location, and closed in 2022 in favour of the current premises. Reviews call this café cute, with specialty coffee that leans towards the robust. 

We return to his museum. “Hold the cup up to the light,” he says. It’s a small porcelain cup, with some painted decoration on the side, but as you hold the bottom up to the light a woman’s face reveals itself. 

Chui selects some of his favourites. There are two larger, solid glasses from a closed cha chaan teng in the Choi Hung public housing estate, which will be redeveloped in 2028. Perhaps they were filled with red beans, tapioca or soya milk on a formica table. There are also functional orange coloured glasses from the 1980s, as well as the easily recognisable vintage porcelain rice grain white cups with a blue decorated band around the top. 

In our conversation, Chui often returns to grassroots themes. He likes repeat customers returning to a set table in the mornings, and he’s less bothered about influencers. For him, his ever-growing collection of glasses, crockery and the homegrown manufactured furniture of Hong Kong represents community, neighbourhood and shared conversations. He does have one concern, though: he worries that if the old ladies in Mongkok see his media coverage, they might put their prices up.

Halfway Coffee and Museum is located at 26 Upper Lascar Row in Sheung Wan.