Ippei-an Ramen & Bar, a Japanese restaurant that has been in operation for 42 years, is located in what people may say is one of Hong Kong’s worst locations.
Energy Plaza, a commercial building in Tsim Sha Tsui East, is no longer a lively spot. Quite a number of restaurants have shut down over the past few years. The lights are dim, and you can hardly find the way to the ramen shop, which is tucked away in the basement.
Yet diners fill the 800-square-foot restaurant at lunch and dinner. Office workers, construction workers, secondary school students and tourists seek comfort in affordable, generous bowls of broth and noodles.
Opened in 1984, Ippei-an bills itself as Hong Kong’s first ramen restaurant. Its founder, Itsuko Shimada, emigrated to Hong Kong 55 years ago.
“I am almost a Hongkonger… I have spent more time in Hong Kong than in Japan,” Shimada spoke to HKFP in English mixed with Cantonese and Japanese. “My life has had its ups and downs here.”
Now in her early 70s, Shimada was a teenager when she and her parents moved from Tokyo to Hong Kong in 1971.
More than a decade later, Shimada, then newly divorced, founded Ippei-an. Her younger son, Kosei Kamatani, was one year old at that time. He later took over the family business after working for a multinational firm.
At its peak, their business had nearly a dozen restaurants across Hong Kong. However, it has been hard hit over the past three years, forcing the closure of several outlets, the mother and son told HKFP.
After suffering significant monthly losses, three restaurants have shuttered since the end of last year, including the 21-year-old branch in Mira Place, a shopping mall in Tsim Sha Tsui.
Their business was not immune to the spate of closures that affected the city’s restaurant and retail sectors in recent years.
“It’s sad to see so many shops and restaurants shutting down in Hong Kong. I’ve never seen this in all my years here,” said Shimada.
‘Too naive to be scared’
When Shimada opened her first ramen restaurant in Energy Plaza in 1984, just a year after the building opened, Hong Kong’s economy was booming.
Tsim Sha Tsui East was a burgeoning business centre at the time, teeming not only with offices but also with nightclubs, discotheques, and restaurants. Shimada recalled that Energy Plaza’s basement housed a popular discotheque back then.
Ippei-an operated from 12pm to 12am, serving mainly white-collar office workers during the day and predominantly clubbers and hostesses at night.
“It was a time when everybody came [to Tsim Sha Tsui] to enjoy themselves. One person could spend HK$2,000, HK$3,000 in one night [at a nightclub], giving HK$1,000 in tips,” Shimada said.
Born in Japan, Shimada never imagined a life in Hong Kong. However, her parents were adventurers who loved travelling to different countries, she said.
In her youth, her mother was a dancer with the renowned Shochiku Kagekidan – Tokyo’s legendary all-female revue, while her father was a manager there. They often travelled abroad for performances as well as for pleasure. After Shimada’s mother retired from dancing, the couple opened a snack bar named Ippei in Tokyo.
“But they didn’t want to just run a small shop in Tokyo. They hoped to explore other opportunities,” said Shimada. Her parents chose Hong Kong because they had friends in the city.
The couple also wanted her to go with them, she said, “because I was their only child.”
After a few years of settling in, they opened a karaoke nightclub in Tsim Sha Tsui in 1978, introducing karaoke, which had become popular in Japan, to Hong Kong.
There were no karaoke venues in Hong Kong at the time, Shimada said. “My parents shipped karaoke equipment from Japan to Hong Kong. But at that time, there were no private rooms. People just sang in the hall.”
After marrying in Japan, Shimada’s then-husband also moved to Hong Kong to assist her parents with the nightclub business. The young couple got divorced a few years later, leaving Shimada to raise her two sons.
To support her family, Shimada decided to follow in her parents’ footsteps and become an entrepreneur. Instead of running a nightclub, she was more interested in the catering business.
“Coincidentally, a friend introduced me to the owner of a renowned Nagasaki ramen restaurant. I ganbatte [persevered] and went to Nagasaki many times to beg him to teach me the recipe, especially the soy sauce-based broth,” Shimada said.
Back then, there were no ramen restaurants in Hong Kong, Shimada said, yet she found the courage to be the first entrepreneur to introduce authentic Japanese ramen to the Chinese-majority population.
She called the restaurant Ippei-an – an homage to her parents’ snack bar in Tokyo.
“I was too naive to be scared,” she said, laughing.
Yet, people usually become more cautious as they gain experience, she added. “Twenty years later, when I opened the second restaurant, I was very worried. Because I was already professional.”
‘Invisible hands’
Shimada said in the 1980s, there were not many Japanese restaurants in Hong Kong, and it was difficult for her to find a Japanese chef. She employed a Hong Kong cook and shared Japanese cuisine recipes with him.
“We couldn’t sell just ramen. So I also offered a variety of Japanese dishes. It’s like what I make at home, bringing people the taste of a mother’s cooking,” she said. Apart from ramen and dumplings, Ippei-an served dishes such as sizzling tofu and clam butter stir-fry.
“Back then in Hong Kong, there weren’t many types of Japanese seasonings available – unlike today, when there are so many available in the supermarkets – so I used to make a lot of sauces myself. Many years later, the chef at our new restaurant was so surprised that we made so many sauces,” Shimada said, giggling.
She juggled life as a working mother. Her parents helped her take care of her two sons, but she made sure to spend time with them. She rushed home every afternoon after the restaurant’s lunch hours, had an early dinner with the children, and headed back to Energy Plaza to work until midnight.
At the time, as many Japanese companies opened offices in Tsim Sha Tsui East, their staff frequented the ramen restaurant. It was where she found a second chance at love.
“I met my husband in the restaurant. He was my customer. He worked at a Japanese company nearby and came to Ippei-an for meals,” Shimada said.
In the early 1990s, she remarried. She thought of returning to Japan once in a while, but she found more opportunities in Hong Kong.
“It was like invisible hands pushing me forward. Other shopping malls invited me to open new restaurants in their venues, ” Shimada said.
In May 2005, she opened an Ippei-an branch in Mira Place and another in Elements, in West Kowloon, in 2007.
At the Mira Place branch, Shimada introduced a dual-concept model. During the day, the focus was on ramen and Japanese set meals. Late at night, the venue transitioned into a Japanese bistro, complete with dimmed lights and candles.
The restaurant capitalised on Hong Kong’s late-night lifestyle. After drinking at bars in Tsim Sha Tsui, customers would head to Ippei-an for comfort food and another round of drinks.
In 2007, Kamatani joined his mother to run the restaurant business. They opened ramen restaurants under a new brand, as well as a Japanese dessert shop.
Finding her roots
The mother-and-son team ran 11 restaurants across the city at their heyday in the early 2010s.
However, around 10 years ago, Kamatani began to notice a drop in business as more Japanese restaurants opened in Hong Kong. Then came the worst.
“Business became unstable during the 2019 social movement. And it was hard during the Covid-19 pandemic, but we tried to cut our costs, with some staff on unpaid leave,” said Kamatani, 43.
“To our surprise, business did not recover after the government lifted all Covid-19 restrictions in early 2023,” he said. He estimated that revenue had dropped by around 30 per cent compared with the pre-pandemic period.
The city’s catering sector has been hit by a wave of closures since 2024. Some entrepreneurs blamed the sluggish business on the mass emigration. Since the border reopened after the pandemic, Hongkongers have flocked to nearby mainland Chinese cities for more affordable meals and entertainment.
Shimada has also noticed some changes: Hong Kong residents are seeking lower prices while mainland Chinese chains are entering the market, offering cheaper options. Main roads in prime shopping areas, such as Nathan Road, have many empty shops.
Her son pointed out that operating a restaurant entails “lots of financial burdens,” such as rent, staff salaries and payments to food suppliers. “Running a catering business in Hong Kong, you’ll probably suffer from mental illness,” Kamatani quipped.
Sometimes Shimada regrets not having purchased a commercial property in Hong Kong.
“I was always thinking maybe I would return to Japan one day. But many things happened, and somehow I stayed here, ” Shimada said. “Now, when I return to Japan, my relatives say I don’t look like a Japanese person anymore.”
After her father died in the early 1990s, the family closed down the karaoke nightclub. Shimada remained in the city to take care of her mother, who died years later.
Shimada mostly retired from restaurants around 10 years ago to focus on caring for her husband, who had Alzheimer’s disease.
Her husband passed away in January. In the same month, Kamatani decided to close the Ippei-an branch in Mira Place.
Their lives are currently in transition. Kamatani is looking for an opportunity as a catering consultant in Europe, while Shimada is considering returning to manage Ippei-an.
The septuagenarian entrepreneur said she was uncertain about Hong Kong’s business prospects but wanted to continue running Ippei-an.
“Many regulars love it here. Some have dined here for many years and later came with their children, their grandchildren,” she said. “I always love seeing some customers sitting cross-legged here, which means they feel comfortable” – just as they are at home.
Recently, their business has been on the rise again, thanks to some foodie YouTubers. People are dining at Ippei-an not only for the noodles but also for the 1980s nostalgia. The landlord of Energy Plaza is being helpful, offering lower rent to its four-decade-long tenant.
“This is my root. I hope it can continue. My wish is that everyone feels happy,” Shimada said. “It feels like home here.”
