14 best things to do in Osaka this spring weekend: March 20–22

Get ready for a weekend of fish frenzy. The Sakana Japan Festival is one of the nation’s largest annual seafood events, celebrating the abundance of Japan’s ocean bounty and supporting the fishing communities along the country’s coastlines.

The Osaka leg of the festival will take place from March 19 to 22 at Expo ’70 Commemorative Park, where the main highlight will be a live tuna-slicing show. As for the eats, you can look forward to tuna, salmon and salmon roe, nodoguro (black-throated seaperch), sea urchin, scallops, oysters, crab and more in the form of traditional fisherman’s meals in various regional styles, plus seafood delicacies from Western, Chinese and other international cuisines...

Put on your most comfortable shoes for a picturesque stroll through the massive Expo ’70 Commemorative Park. Formerly the site of the 1970 World Expo, the park is now one of Osaka’s top cherry blossom destinations, boasting around 5,500 sakura trees across 12 varieties.

While you’ll find cherry blossoms throughout the grounds, locals tend to flock to Higashioji Street in the Natural and Cultural Gardens. Here, around 100 sakura trees stretch on for about 200 metres to form a stunning cherry blossom tunnel.

Throughout the festival period, this scenic spot also hosts lively street performances between 10am and 6pm, making it the perfect place to enjoy a hanami (cherry blossom-viewing) picnic. The organisers have revealed that this section of the park will even stay open after sundown for a special cherry blossom illumination – exact dates to be announced soon...

If you can only visit one location for cherry blossoms this spring, Osaka Castle Park is your best option. Aside from the ticketed Nishinomaru Garden with its cherry blossom illumination, the Ninomaru area near the main enclosure also comes alive with a vibrant month-long event. The free Osaka Castle Spring Festival combines food, music, Japanese culture and, of course, cherry blossom viewing to celebrate the arrival of spring.

In addition to the food trucks that are stationed there from 9.30am to 6pm, you’ll also find a host of cultural activities and workshops on selected days – and they are free to join. You can check out the calligraphy experience on Thursday March 19, learn how to make soba on two separate Fridays, March 20 and April 10, discover a chigiri-e (paper collage) art workshop on Thursday April 2, and partake in origami lessons on Thursday April 9...

Back in the day – long before it was reopened as a garden and integrated into the expansive Osaka Castle Park – Nishinomaru Garden was believed to be the residence of Kita no Mandokoro, wife of the legendary samurai Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Today, it’s one of Osaka’s most popular cherry blossom destinations.

The sprawling 6.5-hectare grounds feature approximately 300 mature sakura trees, primarily the beloved Somei Yoshino variety, along with a scattering of weeping cherry trees. When the sakura are in bloom, the garden extends its hours until 9pm, offering a unique opportunity to admire the blooms after nightfall, when they are bathed in soft illumination. With the majestic Osaka Castle glowing in the background, this setting creates an iconic springtime view of Osaka.

Hidden among the high-rises of Umeda, Tsuyutenjin Shrine – affectionately known as Ohatsu Tenjin – hosts one of Osaka’s most charming flea markets on the first and third Friday of every month.

The market is modest in size, but its convenient location makes it a must-visit for treasure hunters looking for something a bit more down-to-earth compared to the commercial bustle of central Osaka. On any given week there can be between 10 to 20 vendors set up beneath the shrine’s stone lanterns, offering a mix of antiques, pottery, retro and Showa-era goods.

The atmosphere is quietly magical. The 1,300-year-old shrine, dedicated to the deities of love and good fortune, is best known for the tragic tale of Ohatsu and Tokubei – Japan’s own Romeo and Juliet. Today, couples visit to hang heart-shaped ema (wish plaques) and pray for lasting love before browsing the market’s retro curiosities.

If you’re planning to eat and drink your way through spring, mark Saturday March 21 in your calendar. Part food market, part sake festival, Kamigata Sake World (or more precisely, Kamigata Nihonshu World) brings together 18 restaurants and sake breweries from across Japan for a six-hour tasting event at a riverside venue.

Each brewery will be paired with a restaurant, with the duo serving up an exclusive dish-and-sake combo created specifically for the festival. The food and drink are chosen to complement each other and served at optimal temperatures.

This year’s line-up includes Tottori’s Tomirei sake paired with washoku (traditional Japanese cuisine) restaurant Ao, Tokyo’s Aonisai collaborating with Niigata’s Abe Brewery, and Osaka’s Ritmicita joining forces with local doburoku (unfiltered sake) maker Utsutsuyo. The remaining pairings span breweries from Niigata and Shimane to Fukuoka and Saga.

The format is simple: grab your tickets, browse the vendor booths, and sample pairings at your own pace. Although, with only six hours to work through 18 pairings at Minatomachi River Place, a little planning goes a long way...

Sitting at the intersection of history, science, magic and horror, mummies are an enduring source of fascination for many – and at the heart of this exhibition featuring a selection of masterpieces from the prestigious Egyptian collection of the Brooklyn Museum. Following successful runs in Tokyo and Hiroshima, the show will be on at the Abeno Harukas Art Museum from March 20 to June 14.

The 150 artefacts on display include sculptures, coffins, jewellery, pottery, earthenware, papyrus scrolls and, of course, human and animal mummies. You can dive right into the lore with immersive video and audio presentations about the pyramids and ancient Egyptian spells, learn about the daily lives of people in the age of the pharaohs, and study up on their beliefs about the afterlife.

In Osaka, spring doesn’t just mean the arrival of the cherry blossoms – it also heralds the thunderous return of what’s always one of the city’s most anticipated sporting spectacles. The March Grand Sumo Tournament brings 15 days of high-stakes wrestling to Edion Arena Osaka, where Japan’s top-ranked athletes compete for the Emperor’s Cup. 

As the second tournament of the year, the showdowns in Osaka are known for setting the tone for the rest of the season, with early-year performances often dictating which wrestlers will dominate the bouts, and headlines, in the year ahead.

Running between March 8 and 22, the tournament has a flexible structure that lets you dip in and out as you please. Its tickets are for all day, so you can catch everything from the morning bouts to the main event matches featuring top-division wrestlers from around 2pm. One re-entry is also allowed until 5pm – perfect for grabbing lunch in nearby Namba between bouts. 

Seating options range from traditional masu-seki box seats, where you’ll remove your shoes and sit on cushions in Japanese-style floor boxes, to Western-style arena chairs in the balcony sections. The most coveted – and priciest – tickets are the ringside seats at ¥20,000, where you’ll sit close enough to the action that wrestlers occasionally tumble into spectators.

If you miss the online ticket sale, a limited number of same-day general seating tickets (usually a few hundred only) are available at the venue, but they’re not guaranteed and don’t include the premium box seats.

Jeff Koons occupies a singular position in contemporary art. Known for his polished surfaces, bold iconography and unapologetic embrace of popular imagery, the American artist has continually blurred the boundaries between high culture and mass consumption. By elevating everyday objects – vacuum cleaners, basketballs, cartoon figures – into the realm of fine art, Koons interrogates value, desire and collective memory. Held in major museum collections worldwide, his works function as both mirrors and provocations, reflecting the aspirations and contradictions of contemporary society.

This exhibition at Espace Louis Vuitton Osaka is organised as part of the Fondation Louis Vuitton’s ‘Hors-les-murs’ program and brings together seven significant sculptures and paintings drawn from the foundation’s collection, tracing the evolution of Koons’s practice from the 1980s onward.

Through collage, exaggeration and seductive reflective surfaces, Koons transforms the ordinary into a site of contemplation and delight, inviting viewers to reconsider the aesthetic and emotional power of what society labels banal.

Winter is the perfect time to enjoy seafood, especially oysters, when they are at their plumpest and most flavoursome. And you can do just that at the Sennan Oyster Festival, held on weekends and public holidays at Umi no Marche, the seaside seafood market at Sennan Long Park.

Festival highlights include the ever-popular Sennan Special Oyster Set Meal, oysters steamed in traditional cans, and the oyster tasting set, which allows you to sample different local and domestic varieties. Other seasonal seafood dishes, such as tempura, udon and rice bowls made with fresh local catches, are also available. Early visitors may even enjoy free oyster soup, served from 11am on a first-come, first-served basis while supplies last.

On selected Sundays (January 25, February 22 and March 22), the festival even features stage shows with taiko drummers and street performers, local sake tasting, and oyster shell craft workshops. There’s also a food rally and lucky draw, with exciting prizes up for grabs.

Note: the event may be canceled in the event of severe weather. For the latest updates, check Sennan City’s Instagram.