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Ever since Harry Styles name-dropped a Los Angeles eatery in one of his songs, scores of women have been lining up outside the café for their chance to sit and eat inside.
Super fans of the singer-songwriter have been traveling from across the country to eat at the Beachwood Café since December 2019, when Harry Styles briefly mentioned it in his song, Falling.
In the song, he sings: ‘And the coffee’s out at the Beechwood Café.’ Many believe the song is about his ex, Camille Rowe, a former Beachwood Canyon resident.
But ever since, owner Mike Fahim told the New York Times, the restaurant has been filled with Gen Z and millennial women, some of whom will wait outside for up to three hours to sit and eat at the café.
He is now capitalizing on the newfound fame, selling merchandise and answering any fans questions about what Harry Styles ate and where he sat.
Harry Styles name dropped the Beechwood Café in his 2019 song Falling
Before Harry Styles released the hit song in 2019, Fahim said the eatery would typically serve around 300 guests from Friday through Sunday.
He said the diners would mostly be a mix of locals, tourists headed to the Hollywood sign nearby, studio executives hosting lunches and celebrities trying to maintain a low profile.
But that all changed in early 2020, when the clientele started to shift to Gen Z girls and young women — some of whom would even bring cardboard cutouts of Styles for photos.
Fahim, who said he had never heard of Harry Styles before, embraced the newfound popularity and made some changes at the 1970s diner.
‘I made the mistake of not bringing in merchandise earlier,’ he said, noting that he only started to offer merchandise when he found eBay and Etsy accounts selling knockoff merchandise for his restaurant.
The tip jar now says ‘Harry Tips Here,’ and a sign depicted in a mural declares ‘The Coffee’s Out’ just like in the song.
Fahim said he and his staff are happy to take photos and answer fans’ questions about what Harry Styles ate (the Beechwood Scramble) and where he sat (the table at the center of the room and the booth in the far right corner).
Someone on his staff even monitors ‘the whole situation on Instagram and TikTok,’ Fahim said, and if Styles is in town — as he was for two weeks in the fall when the café ran out of merchandise and menu items — Fahim doubles up on staff and supplies.
Now, he says he typically sees about 1,000 diners every weekend.
Ever since, scores of Gen Z and millennial women have been lining up outside the Los Angeles eatery, waiting hours for their chance to sit inside
The restaurant sees nearly 1,000 customers each weekend, after previously only seeing about 300
Many believe the line is about his ex, Camille Rowe, a former Beachwood Canyon resident
Many come from states across the country, with Casey Gossweiler, 27, from Maryland telling the New York Times: ‘I just felt like coming here would complete the whole Harry Styles experience.’
Noelle Jay, 26, described being at the café as ‘pain-inducing,’ saying: ‘I could literally evaporate thinking about’ being in the same space where Harry Styles once ate eggs.
‘He’s like my comfort person, my light, my inspiration, all of the above,’ she said, as her cousin, Mia Tucci, 17, said ‘he’s like a god.’
Nathan Freeman, 26 and his wife, Shannon Freeman, 25, were also in line early one Thursday morning after spending the previous day at the Sycamore Cove Beach in Malibu, where fans say Styles filmed videos for Watermelon Sugar and the One Direction hit What Makes You Beautiful.
‘It’s a family in a lot of ways,’ Taylor Anderson — who once made her family do a detour during an Amalfi Coast vacation to visit a street where Styles filmed parts of the Golden music video, which she only found by searching Google Maps for landmarks in the background — said of the fandom.
‘A good example of how the online world connects people.’
Her friend, Alyson Johnston added: ‘You can just kind of look at someone and if they’re our age and wearing clothes that resemble the Harry style, it’s like “Ok, these are people you can talk to.”‘
Xoee Margolis, 26, explained that the term is Harry-coding for dressing as Harry Styles.
Many Harry Styles super fans travel from across the country for the chance to sit inside
Fans have said they have formed a sort of family that was connected online
Wait times at the Los Angeles restaurant can be up to three hours
The café owner has decided to capitalize on the newfound fame, selling merchandise and renaming the tip jar
On one Saturday morning ahead of a Harry Styles concert in town, the Times reports, a line started forming outside the eatery a full hour before it opened.
By 8.40am, Nicholas Brown, the actor who plays Cousin Greg in Succession, joined in but left before he was seated — apparently exasperated by the long line.
At one point, the wait times were between two to three hours.
But locals Jim Krantz, 67, and Brian Burchfield, 59, explained that it was not always like this.
‘I mean this was like Mayberry RFD, but not anymore,’ said Krantz, referencing the 1968 spinoff of The Andy Griffith Show.
‘I think it’s fascinating, a social phenomenon,’ he said. ‘But it’s a bit of an inconvenience when it comes to being able to do your daily life up here.’
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