A Beachside Cafe in Panwa Beach
Jouet D’Art, which means Art Toys in French, is a glasshouse café set inside My Beach Resort on Panwa Beach, on the quieter southeast side of Phuket. The design is Victorian in style, all glass walls and mirrors, decorated with modern art toys and dolls that give the room its name. Big windows open onto Chalong Bay, so the sea and the sunset become part of the room itself. I think it is one of the prettiest cafés on this part of the island.
The whole place leans into a fairy-tale idea. Glass cabinets, mirrors and quirky figurines fill the space, and the cakes are dressed to match. It feels more like a small gallery than a normal beach café, which is rather the point.
The café shares its entrance with My Beach Resort, near Ao Yon. From the lobby you walk down to find it, and the room spreads across two levels with a few different areas to sit. One of the nicest spots is the seaside terrace, which looks out over the bay, the hills and the Big Buddha in the distance. It is a calm setting, well away from the busier beaches and nightlife of the west coast.
The kitchen focuses on desserts and drinks rather than full meals, so this is a place for cake and coffee rather than lunch. A Thai pastry chef makes everything fresh each day, mixing French patisserie technique with Japanese and Thai ideas. The result is a small range of cakes that each look and taste a little different from the last. Good ingredients sit behind it all, including AOP butter from Normandy, Uji Matcha from Japan and Valrhona chocolate.
Popular choices include the coconut cake, the banoffee pie and the strawberry shortcake. The afternoon tea is also worth a look if you want to try a bit of everything in one sitting. On the drinks side there is coffee, tea, cocoa, smoothies and a few cocktails and mocktails. The Dirty Coffee and the Matcha Dirty get the most attention, and the Thai tea is a good local choice.
My Beach Resort itself is a small luxury hotel built on a hillside, and it has featured in the Michelin Guide as a preferred hotel. There are two pools, a sky bar for sunset drinks and free kayaks and paddleboards. Jouet D’Art works as a reason to come even if you are not staying there. It pairs well with a slow afternoon around Cape Panwa, perhaps after a swim at nearby Ao Yon or Khao Khad. I rate it as one of the most photogenic cafés in Phuket, and the cakes hold up beyond the looks.
Jouet D’Art Info
Location: Panwa Beach – My Beach Resort
Address: 105 Soi Ao-Yon Khaokhad, Wichit, Mueang Phuket District, Phuket 83000
Hours: 7 am – 7.00 pm
Phone: 076 390 600
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jouetdart/
Jouet D’Art Map
Phuket Restaurants Directory
