Waking up the gayborhood: Blocleaf Café

Photos by Beatrice Faicol

Let’s face it: Malate will never reach the golden gay stature it once had between the ‘90s and early aughts. While we don’t have quite the same glorious gay district, the neighborhood could be waking up to a new dawn—and, as most things do, it could begin with a necessary cup of coffee.

Blocleaf Café, a sight for sore eyes in Malate, could be the caffeine-pumping hub that elevates it to a new age of thoughtful entrepreneurship and design. You’d expect no less from Reymart Cerin and Vince Africa, founders of notable design studio, The Public School Manila. Partners in both life and business, the duo worked with furniture crafters Fabricca to create sleek, serene light wood furniture and a space that won’t look out of place in the pages of Monocle.

Meditative and modern as the space is with its touches of greenery, it’s the ideal venue to think up your own start-up (or sketch the cute guy reading TEAM at the corner). Most especially when your synapses are stimulated by a delicious selection of tea lattes (their iced matcha is a must-try!), cold brew teas, and coffee beverages. Given the optic balm that this place is, long hours in Blocleaf will make you hungry: a good thing considering casual, continental bites like a simply satisfying croissant with a choice of cream cheese and butter, or well-traveled Filipino food like the longaniza pasta. (Oh, and if you’ve managed to eye-fuck that cute guy at the corner into joining you, you’ll want to share a slice of the house’s chocnut cake). Ah, welcome to the beginnings of a well-rounded new gayborhood.

Hey, queer reader or ally.

The facts are as obvious as Manny Pacquiao’s homophobia: in order to run a decent website that our queer tastes deserve, your favorite gay Asian publication could use a real TEAM effort from its readers.\

If you’d like to see more of TEAM, we hope you can take the time to help your homos out.

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