--- title: New York City's First Cat Cafe: Meow Parlour Video description: The purrfect place for cat lovers canonical: https://time.com/3630665/meow-parlour-first-cat-cafe-new-york-city/ author: Olivia B. Waxman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-12-12T20:31:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:03:08.186Z og:title: Here's What It's Like Inside New York's First Cat Café og:description: The purrfect place for cat lovers og:url: https://time.com/3630665/meow-parlour-first-cat-cafe-new-york-city/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte3a5f82f1c225cfe/69876e7b06f2c12ace332d44/meow-parlour.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1500 og:image:height: 844 og:image:alt: meow-parlour og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Here's What It's Like Inside New York's First Cat Café twitter:description: The purrfect place for cat lovers twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte3a5f82f1c225cfe/69876e7b06f2c12ace332d44/meow-parlour.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Here's What It's Like Inside New York's First Cat Café > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-brief-2026q3/newsletters?i=d8ec24d4-6413-4bfe-971a-ed3c055a8970&cr=time-nl-brief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Lil Bub: Not All Glitter And Catnip [Watch (HLS stream): Lil Bub: Not All Glitter And Catnip](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/eXkhofQI.m3u8) (2:27)  _Published 2013-10-30. Lil Bub and owner Mike Bridavsky describe the hectic touring life of a famous feline._  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Dec 12, 2014 8:31 PM UTC  A cat photographed at Meow Parlour, New York City's first cat café, in December 2014. A cat photographed at Meow Parlour, New York City's first cat café, in December 2014. TIME  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Dec 12, 2014 8:31 PM UTC [Meow Parlour](http://www.meowparlour.com/), New York City’s first permanent cat café, will open its doors on Monday, Dec. 15\. Cat lovers will be able to make reservations online and spend up to five hours ($4 per 30 minutes) hanging out at a storefront space on Manhattan’s Lower East Side while playing with cats provided by [Kitty Kind](http://kittykind.org/), a local rescue and adoption group. Seven felines are there to start — with names like Lucky Lemon and Squinkles — but co-founders Emilie Legrand and Christina Ha hope to eventually feature about a dozen cats. Later this month, the Meow Parlour Patisserie will open nearby so customers can buy macarons and jam cookies shaped like cat faces and bring them to the Meow Parlour, which is how the space complies with city health regulations. Upon entering Meow Parlour, humans must take off their shoes on a mat that says “BEWARE OF CAT” (a house rule meant to prevent the spread of germs). A few steps past the litter boxes, friendly felines may be curled up atop brown and beige pillows scattered across the floor or inside a cardboard ice cream truck or a comfy gray nap pod. There’s a custom-built wooden bench along the back wall where the cats weave in and out of openings underneath or perch in the bookshelves above, which have more cotton-canvas cat beds for napping and people watching, as well as throw pillows featuring cat illustrations and the words “le chat” (French for cat). Even the legs of the tables for humans have steps inside so the animals can climb up as customers sit on metal bar stools. This “cat heaven” of sorts is the latest in the cat café trend that dates back to the late 1990s in Taiwan and Japanese cities like Tokyo and Osaka, where they became refuges for people who lived in apartment buildings that didn’t allow pets. While Purina ONE hosted a four-day-long pop-up cat café in the same Manhattan neighborhood earlier this year, Meow Parlour would be the second in the U.S. — [Cat Town Cafe](http://time.com/3539012/cat-cafe-oakland/) in Oakland became the first when it opened almost two months ago. Now there are cat cafés throughout Europe in Paris, London, Vienna, Budapest, as well as in [Canada](http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/travel/2014/10/18/crazy-cat-ladies-rejoice-the-first-two-kitty-cafes-north-america-now-open-montreal/bVIcWnIkM1bYn50mO6rl3L/story.html) and Australia. More are expected to open in Seattle, Portland, Oregon and Washington D.C. sometime in 2015. And at a time when cat videos are so popular online that there are cat video festivals and cat art shows nationwide, cat cafés are sure to become another space where cat fans can connect [IRL](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real%5Flife). _With reporting and video by Salima Koroma, Carlos Martinelli, and Adam Perez._ **MORE:** [TIME “Interviews” Grumpy Cat](http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/03/22/grumpy-cat-is-not-impressed-by-times-photoshoot/) ## Transcript Hey Bub. On a crash course destined for planet Earth, comes an extraordinary, one of a kind cat. [ MUSIC ] Little Bub is a cat that was born with various genetic mutations including Dwarfism and Osteoporosis. She shot to fame after her owner, Mike Bradofsky posted pictures of her on the Internet. Personally I don't like the term internet cats. Oh yeah? It's just a cat. As well as writing a book and hosting her own talk show, Bub regularly meets fans at cat events throughout the country. We do meet and greets, so many people come to them and you'll have people waiting in line six hours before a meet and greet just to see them for a minute. And they're exau -, they are exhausting. [ SOUND ] For me this is a totally still, a year and a half later, a totally bizarre experience. The people that would recognize me or my cat are fans of my cat, and the people that are fans of my cat are nice people. [ SOUND ] I think her first trip was Good Morning America. And that's when it was like a test. I mean I couldn't believe how well she did. Traveling with Bub, she's great. Which is the only reason I still do this stuff. Me on the other hand, I don't know if I look wiped out now, but I'm wiped out. We fly like two to. Six times a month. But Bub loves it, she's actually the most well- behaved on the plane. Traveling's good for her, actually, for her bone condition. She's the most active when we travel. She gets around a lot more, she plays more, she actually eats a lot more, poops a lot more. It's just more Bub. [ SOUND ] But I mean, look at her, she's a very special cat. Beyond her looks, the reason that she became popular on the Internet is because she looks so unique, but. I think it's more than that. She has this magical demeanor. She really likes David Lynch movies. [ SOUND ] People assume that just because of the way she looked, that she was different, that she was stupid or dumb. People see something that's different or not, doesn't. Fit the norm and assume that it's wrong, or that it's stupid, or dumb. Discovering all these things that make her a specialties pet actually ends up being extremely rewarding. Pets like this give back ten- fold, I think. She really appreciates what I do for her and how much work it takes to take care of, of a pet like Bub. This is the only cat I've seen that makes people cry on a regular basis, tears of joy. She's my best friend. 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