Lin Heung Lau rises again: how the 100-year-old teahouse upholds traditions while adapting to the times
Lin Heung Lau, the famous diner on Wellington Street in Hong Kong, has now reopened in place, keeping the handwritten wall menus and dim sum trolleys
Change comes for all of us, in the end, and Hong Kong is no stranger to it. As those who grew up eating Cantonese food will know, for all the nostalgia, time-honoured technique and tradition, the foods that were once commonplace slip further and further away from current tastes until finally they are no longer seen. So how can a 100-year-old restaurant expect to survive in a city where dining trends seem to be constantly changing? The owners of Lin Heung Lau believe it can be the exception to the rule.
Originally a teahouse founded in 1889 in Guangzhou, three branches opened across Hong Kong in 1918. The Lin Heung on the corner of Wellington Street and Aberdeen Street was the last of them to survive, having moved there in 1996 from Queen’s Road Central.
Against the odds, the storied Wellington Street dim sum parlour survived closure in 2019 and 2022, when plans to convert the building were shelved amid a lacklustre economic environment. In April this year, Lin Heung Lau was reopened under management comprising former staff members, who wisely decided that remaining in the original location was more conducive to longevity than a shift to unfamiliar new grounds.
It’s true – so much of a restaurant is its location. While recipes, kitchenware and chefs can travel, certain feelings and memories are embedded within the walls of a restaurant. Returning to Lin Heung Lau, I was relieved to see that relatively little of those surroundings have changed. While the morning newspapers are no longer in the hands of its breakfasting customers, in a little nod to posterity the restaurant menus are in the same shape as the broadsheets. Some will note with dismay the ground floor’s wife cake and lotus seed paste cake bakery has been replaced with a rather cut-and-paste hand-shaken tea bar. Nevertheless, the dark-wood tables and chairs, bright fluorescent lights, handwritten wall menus and most importantly, trundling dim sum trolleys all remain.
The dim sum trolleys are intrinsic to Lin Heung Lau and keep the nostalgia factor high. Rather than customers ordering dim sum à la carte, servers emerge pushing steaming carts laden high with bamboo steamers and announce to the dining room what they contain. Savvy diners know to pre-empt their arrival and will be first in line, ordering card in hand, to secure the freshest, steamiest char siu baos or signature pork liver siu mai.
