14 DAY TRIAL // When you first see images of this unusually themed restaurant in China, you may be a little bit confused. That’s because instead on normal chairs, clients sit on lavatories, and food is served in toilet-shaped dishes.
Located in Tianzifang, Shanghai, the “More Than Toilet” restaurant offers customers the unique experience of enjoying a drink or snack in a bathroom-themed environment.
At the entrance, diners are welcomed by a steaming bathtub with legs hanging out of it. Inside the restaurant, customers sit on lavatories that have toilet-seat-shaped cushions to keep them comfy while eating, according to Smart Shangai.
All of the decorations inside the eatery are also bathroom-related, including urinals used as lampshades, washbasins and bathtubs covered with glass used as dining tables, and metal showerheads on the ceiling.
Visitors may be surprised to find so many toilet bowls in a restaurant, while many other diners in the country do not have their own toilet, and clients are forced to relieve themselves in public restrooms.
On the menu at “More Than Toilet,” clients can find ice cream, coffee, juice, tea, spaghetti, sandwiches and toast, in addition to some popular Taiwanese snacks.
“It shows that dining here is all about leisure, and that our customers can relax and have fun,” says Zhou Wenjie, the manager of the restaurant.
“More Than Toilet” is a restaurant chain known as Modern Toilet in Taiwan, and has now become very popular in China as well. The first restaurant of this kind appeared in Taiwan in 2004 as an ice cream parlor serving chocolate ice cream inside toilet shaped bowls.
The concept developed rapidly and now the restaurants also serve other kinds of meals, obviously in toilet-themed vessel.
In China, there are many other restaurants of this type open in Kunming, Shenzhen, Jinjiang, Foshan, Xiamen, and Chongqing. The Taikang Road establishment is the chain's only branch in Shanghai.
If you were to ask me, the food does not look appetizing at all. It seems that it isn’t so much designed to be eaten as it is to be photographed and posted on social websites. So, this restaurant could turn into the best place for dieters.
China has many other themed restaurants, like a Kung-Fu themed restaurant, where waiters perform karate chops while serving dishes, a Hello Kitty restaurant, and an Eighties schoolroom eatery that accepts only customers who can prove they would have been at school in the decade.
