Suwon tea café with a smell-before-you-pick menu: Caffeine Focus

Hi everyone ◡̎ Today I'm bringing you a review of ❛ Caffeine Focus ❜, a café I visited during a date around Hwaseong Fortress's Haenggung-dong (행궁동). When picking a café, the taste of drinks and desserts matters, but I think the atmosphere of the space matters just as much. Haenggung-dong especially has so many pretty, aesthetic cafés that I'm always torn about where to go on a date 𓂃 ꒒ ০ ⌵ ୧ ♡ On this day too, while wandering around Haenggung-dong, we found a café with a gorgeous view of the Hwaseong Fortress wall, and the scenery was too pretty to just walk past, so we went in haha.

Caffeine Focus location, parking and opening hours

Caffeine Focus is in a spot that's great to stop by while exploring Haenggung-dong around the Hwaseong Fortress wall. Walking slowly along the fortress wall from Jangan Gate (장안문) takes about 10 minutes, so it's pretty accessible!

There's a parking space right in front of the café, and if it's full, you can use the nearby Changnyongmun public parking lot! Since Haenggung-dong itself gets a lot of visitors on weekends, if you're driving, I'd recommend heading out a bit early 🚗

• Wed–Mon 11:00 ~ 20:00
• Closed every Tuesday

Caffeine Focus isn't right in the middle of Haenggung-dong's main street — it's a bit further in toward the fortress wall — so it actually felt quiet and relaxed. As you get closer to the café, the fortress wall starts coming into view, so the walk itself is really pretty!

What is Caffeine Focus like on a Thursday afternoon?

Honestly, most cafés in Haenggung-dong are crowded and busy regardless of weekday or weekend, but on the Thursday afternoon I visited, Caffeine Focus had relatively open seating and felt quiet overall ••🌿

Mostly there were people on dates like us, along with people spending time quietly alone or working with their laptops open. Maybe it was the pretty view out the window and the relaxed atmosphere, but time passed by faster than I expected ••♥

The tea menu you smell before you choose

Caffeine Focus has a variety of signature menu items, and the process of choosing a tea (TEA) is a little special. Instead of just picking by the name, you can actually smell the scent before choosing! For someone like me who doesn't know teas well, it can be hard to guess the scent from the name alone, but being able to smell it directly meant I could immediately tell if it was a scent I liked or not — I thought it was such a thoughtful touch, and especially helpful if you're trying a tea for the first time ••! ♥😳

The bakery menu was also varied and fun to look through, and if you're someone hunting for bakeries in Haenggung-dong, I'd say it's worth browsing the bread selection too 🥖

Ordering the strawberry latte, Rosy Peach oolong tea and plain ciabatta

• 🍓 Strawberry latte - ₩6,300
• 🍑 Rosy Peach (oolong tea) - ₩5,500
• 🥖 Plain ciabatta - ₩4,500

I can't really drink coffee, so I went with the strawberry latte, and it wasn't heavy or overly sweet, so I think anyone who likes sweet drinks would find it easy to enjoy! Sometimes you get places with an artificial-tasting version, but this genuinely tasted like homemade strawberry syrup latte(?) 🍓🥺 I was a little tired from walking around taking photos, but one sip of that sweet strawberry latte instantly lifted my mood ~ ㅋㅋㅎㅎ

The Rosy Peach oolong tea smells fairly sweet, but when you actually drink it, it doesn't leave a heavy aftertaste, so it paired well with the plain ciabatta 🍑 We picked Rosy Peach oolong after smelling several scents, and the delicate peach fragrance comes through gently while the clean, slightly bitter character of oolong tea kept me sipping it again and again!

The plain ciabatta was plainness itself 🥖 It wasn't bread with flashy toppings or fillings, more of a truly basic ciabatta, but that mild, slightly savory taste was the whole point — it didn't have a strong flavor that would compete with the drinks, so it was easy to pick off a piece here and there alongside them! As I ate I thought, "this would be really good with kaymak spread on it••🤤" haha.

Fortress-wall views from the window and the outdoor terrace

We originally just went in to rest for a bit and have a drink during our date, but somehow we ended up sitting there for quite a while haha•••~

With the fortress wall visible out the window, every time I looked up in between sips it just put me in a good mood ••🤭 It's not like we went on a trip far away, but looking out at a view different from everyday life while sipping a coffee gave a little feeling of being on a short trip! So I think if you like the Hwaseong Fortress wall view, it'd be worth visiting just to sit quietly and enjoy the scenery •••🏰🤍

Oh, and there's also an outdoor terrace space, so as the weather gets cooler these days, it'd be nice to sip coffee out there while taking in the surroundings 🌤️

Being able to spend quiet time looking out at the Hwaseong Fortress wall view just felt romantic, which made me like it even more 🥺♥ It's good for escaping the crowds of Haenggung-dong and resting somewhere calm, and also good for having a cup of tea with pretty scenery on a date like ours — so if you're looking for a café with a Hwaseong Fortress wall view or want a quiet date spot in Haenggung-dong, I'd recommend Caffeine Focus! 🤍