On a crisp Sunday morning, Zheng Shiying drove 130km to a village on the outskirts of Beijing, not for a hike or a hot spring, but for a cup of coffee.
It took Zheng over three hours to reach the cafe. Housed in a crumbling stone building that looks untouched by time, it was already packed with weekend visitors by the time Zheng arrived, and finding a seat was a bit of a challenge.
"I've never woken up this early for work," she joked.
A city cafe keeps you awake, while a village cafe helps you unwind. Zheng is one of many urban Chinese heading deep into the countryside in search of rural calm. Far from the city's polished espresso bars, village cafes offer customers a refreshing change of pace.
In a village in Dongguan, for example, a cafe by a railway has become an urban-escape hotspot. Facing the tracks and shaded by ancient trees, it offers front-row seats to thundering trains.
Owner Ye Zhongwen, who loved chasing trains as a kid, opened the Red Guan Coffee in 2024 in a two-storey house that had sat vacant for years.For Ye, the remote location wasn't a flaw but a feature.
And Ye is not alone, some of the cafe's customers drive 40 minutes from Dongguan, others travel over two hours from Shenzhen, and even visitors from Hong Kong have made the trip.
"At first, villagers were curious and skeptical," Ye said. "Now many are regulars, and they're glad the cafe is drawing more people who also buy their farm produce and other goods."
China's rural cafe boom has been fueled by the rise of rural tourism. According to estimates from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, rural tourism across the country welcomed 707mil visits in the first quarter of this year, up 8.9% year on year.
Over 40,000 cafes have sprung up in China's countryside. Increasingly, these village cafes are more than just coffee stops but creative hubs revitalising rural spaces.
In a village in Quzhou City, Zhejiang Province, one such cafe sprang to life from a dilapidated sheep shed halfway up an abandoned mining hill.
"It was the only usable structure around back in 2023," said Yu Jiafu, founder of the Sheep Shed Cafe. "No roof, just broken walls and waist-high weeds. We gave it the English name 'Young People Coffee', a playful pun on 'Yang Peng' or sheep shed in Chinese, hoping to draw more young people to the countryside."
Yu, a graduate of the China Academy of Art, saw beauty and potential in the wild setting. He and his team rebuilt the roof with thatch, kept the original stone structure, and used nearby mountain rocks to build the bar.
"Our guests now range from city dwellers on weekend road trips to local youths who treat this place like their living room," Yu said.
At its busiest, the cafe welcomed more than 5,000 visitors in a single day. On regular weekends, guests come from nearby cities like Hangzhou and Shanghai. Even foreign travellers and Internet influencers with millions of followers have stopped by.
Since its opening, the cafe's grounds have evolved to suit the clientele, now boasting a swimming pool, an open-air performance stage, a camping area, and a wood-fired bread oven.
In April, Zhejiang hosted its first "Village Cafe Masters" event, where 33 coffee entrepreneurs showcased their brands and products. A rural coffee base was also unveiled that links academia, industry, and local communities in support of countryside coffee development.
Alongside the event, local authorities introduced support programmes including digital training, resource matchmaking, and e-commerce tools to help young entrepreneurs thrive in rural areas.
These efforts are part of Zhejiang's broader initiative to encourage youth-led development in rural areas. By 2025, Zhejiang plans to establish 1,000 rural practice hubs to offer young people more room to explore, innovate, and stay rooted in the countryside.
For Yu, that mission is already personal. "I'm not here just to run a cafe," he said. "I want to help the village grow, one cup at a time." - Xinhua/ANN
