Jasmina Mitrovic

Have you ever walked into a place you swear you’ve seen before, even though you know you haven’t? Maybe it’s an empty hotel corridor, a playground after dark or the blue glow of an indoor pool with nobody in it. There’s nothing obviously scary about it. It might even feel weirdly comforting. Still, something’s off. Stay too long and the comfort starts to curdle. Backrooms – the lowdown If you’ve spent enough time online, you’ve probably seen places like this described as liminal spaces, dreamcore or the Backrooms. These terms overlap, but they don’t mean exactly the same thing. In architecture and anthropology, ‘liminal’ describes a threshold, or the space between one place and another. Online, the definition has become a lot looser. It can mean an actual transitional space, like a hallway, waiting room or station, but it can also be somewhere familiar made uncanny by the absence of the people who should be there. Dreamcore leans more into hazy childhood memories and the strange logic of dreams, like playrooms, artificial clouds, endless fields and old images that feel nostalgic even when you don’t remember living through them. The Backrooms takes that same feeling and turns it into somewhere you might never escape. Of course, what counts as a Backrooms level is subjective. One person’s Backrooms is another person’s rundown community centre. It’s less about following one strict formula and more about the feeling: something familiar that you can’t quite remember, comfort mixed

There are levels to looksmaxxing. Long before some corners of the internet turned self-improvement into something weird, Japan had already built an entire beauty culture around details. The flyaways matter. The pores matter. The dullness under your eyes after a night out in Tokyo? Easy fix. That is part of why skincare here can feel so intense, but also so good: it is equal parts practicality, ritual and low-level obsession. The downside is that finding the right product can melt your brain. Walk into a Donki, open Qoo10 or browse through Cosme for ten minutes, and suddenly every pink bottle is promising the same glossy new face. Some of it is gimmick, some of it is actually worth your money, and telling the difference is half the battle. To save you the deep search, here are seven products that are getting real traction in Japan right now. All of the products on this list are available at most Don Quijote stores around the city, as well as the @cosme Store in Harajuku.

Tokyo is very good at hiding small portals in plain sight. Between the polished shopping complexes, convenience stores and extremely serious office buildings, there are parks where giant concrete elephants become slides, a blue robot waits in the middle of a housing complex, and an enormous banana casually sits in a Nerima neighbourhood like it has always paid rent there. These are children’s parks, technically, but they also work as tiny public art detours, lunch-break escape routes, scroll-break spots – and proof that Tokyo’s best weirdness is often hiding in a residential backstreet. Bring kids, bring a camera, bring a snack, or just bring your tired adult brain and let it look at giant ogre for five minutes. Sometimes that is enough. RECOMMENDED: The 20 best things to do in Tokyo with kids

From Shogun and shokunin to city pop and Pokémon, Japan’s already Godzilla-sized global cultural footprint is still growing – not least thanks to a hungry new generation of artists and artisans who aren’t content with competing domestically, instead setting their sights on capturing the hearts and feeds of the world from the get-go. Here are a few names you’re bound to hear more about very soon.

タイムアウト東京 > レストラン&カフェ >東京、絶品ホットドッグ7選 ホットドッグといえばアメリカのファストフードの定番だが、東京ではこのジューシーな王道グルメが独自の進化を遂げている。 マスタードやピクルス、野菜を細かく刻んだ「レリッシュ」だけでシンプルに味わう伝統的なスタイルから、バンズからこぼれ落ちそうなほど具材を詰め込んだボリューム満点の一品まで、その種類は実に多彩。中には原宿や歌舞伎町を移動しながら営業する本格的な屋台もあり、昔ながらのストリートフードの魅力を今に伝えている。 屋外での食事が楽しいシーズン。わざわざ足を運ぶ価値のある名店を、タイムアウト東京英語版編集部が厳選して紹介する。 関連記事『タイムアウト「世界のベストバーガー」ランキングで東京の「smash things」が1位』

タイムアウト東京 > ショッピング＆スタイル >東京、個性派セレクトショップ23選 東京は「デザイナーの都」というだけではなく、人々が服装を言語のように捉えて身にまとっているという意味でも、真の「ファッションの都」といえる。東京のファッションを理解するには、スマートフォンの画面をひたすら追うよりも、ファッションに情熱を注ぐスタッフがいる場所へ直行するのがいいだろう。 そのユニークで多様なカルチャーは原宿を中心に、東京各地で息づいている。ここでは、ファストファッションに頼らず個性を磨きたい人に向けて、独自のコミュニティを象徴する23のセレクトショップをタイムアウト東京英語版編集部が厳選して紹介する。 関連記事『原宿・神宮前、個性派セレクトショップ10選』

タイムアウト東京 > ショッピング＆スタイル >原宿・神宮前、個性派セレクトショップ13選 東京は、信号待ちの人やコンビニエンスストアの客の服装にさえ深いこだわりが宿る「ファッションの都」だ。ここでは服が一種の言語として機能しており、個性はブランド名ではなく、細部への選択や着こなしに表れる。街には多様な細分化したシーンが混在し、それぞれが独自のスタイルを追求している。 その無数のファッションシーンが世界最大級の密度で凝縮されているのが、原宿・神宮前エリアだ。この街のファッションを理解するにはスマートフォンをスクロールするより、独自の視点を持つショップへ足を運んで情熱的なスタッフと触れ合うのが一番である。 ここでは、ファストファッションに頼らず個性を磨きたい人へ向けて、タイムアウト英語版編集部が厳選した13のショップを紹介する。 関連記事『1000枚超のビンテージTシャツが集結する「大Tシャツ展」が開催』

As the weather gets hotter, we’re all starting to itch for reasons to be outside. Parks fill up, terraces get crowded, and suddenly that mid-stroll konbini chicken just isn’t hitting the spot. Tokyo might not be famous for eating while walking, but the city has plenty of places making a solid case for a little street meat, whether you’re posted up on a bench, hovering outside a cart or doing the discreet sidewalk shuffle with sauce on your hand. The hot dog might be a North American staple, but Tokyo has taken the fat and juicy classic in its own direction. Across the city, you’ll find everything from traditional dogs with mustard and relish to overstuffed glizzies piled with chilli, cheese, salsa, pickles and whatever else can reasonably fit inside a bun. There’s even a proper cart guy moving between Harajuku and Kabukicho, keeping the old-school street food dream alive.Whether you’re craving a taste of home, looking for something to eat in the sun or just want to know where Tokyo’s best glizzy is hiding, these are the hot dogs worth crossing town for. RECOMMENDED: 28 best cheap eats in Tokyo – all for ¥1,200 or less

タイムアウト東京 > ホテル > 東京近郊、最高にクールなラブホテル7選 日本のラブホテルは、単なる宿泊施設という枠を超え、街のいたるところで強烈な存在感を放つ「多機能エンターテインメント空間」へと変貌を遂げている。ちょっとした仮眠や出張時の宿としてはもちろん、充実のフードメニューを頼んで女子会を楽しんだり、コスチュームをレンタルして非日常のキャラクターになりきれたりする場所としても機能しているのだ。 中には、感度の高いファッション写真のロケ地に選ばれたり、アートプロジェクトとコラボレーションを展開したりする名店も存在する。用途を限定しないその自由度の高さから、本来の目的で一度も使ったことがない若者たちの間でも、現在はカルト的な人気を博すほどだ。 ラブホテルが提供するもの、それは「ファンタジー」にほかならない。昨今流行の無難なミニマリズムをあっさりと投げ捨て、掲げたコンセプトの世界観をこれでもかと徹底的に作り込む。万人受けする均一なホスピタリティーばかりが目指されがちな都市において、過剰さや好奇心、最高の意味での「悪趣味（バッドテイスト）」を堂々と全肯定してくれる空間なのだ。 日常を抜け出して刺激が欲しいなら、今週末はラブホテルでステイケーションを決め込んでみるのはどうだろう。世間の行楽シーズンや休日でも変わらない安心のシステムで迎えてくれる。いつもと違う刺激的な冒険を求め、これから紹介するユニークな空間へ一歩足を踏み入れてみてほしい。 関連記事『東京、昭和レトロなラブホテル6選』

タイムアウト東京 > ナイトライフ > 東京・大阪・京都で今、行くべきナイトライフスポット6選 夜をどう過ごすかで、旅の深さが変わる。音楽に身を委ねるのも、温泉で疲れを癒やすのも、カウンターでグラスを傾けるのも、その街を知るための手がかりになる。 ここでは、こだわりのサウンドに浸れるミュージックバー、「原宿カルチャー」を感じられるレストラン、アートギャラリーとギャルバーを兼ねた歌舞伎町らしいヴェニュー、梅田の夜空を望む健康増進施設、「ダンスミュージック好きの聖地」と評されるクラブ、京都らしい食材を用いた実験的なカクテルを提供するバーなど、東西6ヴェニューを厳選して紹介する。 関連記事『東京のベストバー28選』『大阪、ベストカクテルバー4選』

Trying to pin hen-kawa down too neatly defeats the point. Somewhere between weird and cute, the concept lives in the gap between polished and not, exuding the charm that comes from something being slightly off, slightly too much, slightly unafraid of looking a little strange. Tokyo has always had pockets of this energy, but Ikebukuro wears it more openly than most. The area on the east side of the station pulls anime culture right to the surface: figure shops, cosplay supply stores, maid cafés stacked between convenience stores and karaoke boxes. The western side runs darker and quieter. Between the two, something genuinely odd has always been allowed to exist here. RECOMMENDED: 55 things to do in Ikebukuro

Messy, stylish and impossible to keep up with, the after-dark scene in Japan’s big cities is always evolving. This list is your shortcut to a handful of the places that matter right now – from a bar-meets-art-gallery in the heart of Tokyo’s neon-lit Kabukicho to Kyoto’s most ambitious new cocktail den and a 24-hour hot-spring haven in Osaka.

One of Shanghai's strangest nightlife exports is coming to Tokyo. Sympathy Angel (交感天使), the cult café and cocktail bar known for mixing Showa-era Japanese nostalgia with lace, religious iconography, taxidermy and underground music, is taking over Campy!bar in Shibuya Parco from August 7 to 11. This is Sympathy Angel's first pop-up in Japan, and it changes character once the sun goes down. By day, the space will operate as a shop selling original Sympathy Angel goods. From 7pm, it turns into a collaboration bar with Campy!bar, complete with limited drinks created for the occasion. The proper welcome happens on August 7. The opening party runs from 6.30pm to 10pm, with a drag show from Campy!bar's queens, a body performance by Ako Suzuki and a closing DJ set from Poison Girl Friend – an artist whose hazy synth-pop and club sensibility feel unusually well matched to Sympathy Angel's beautiful little fever dream. If you miss opening night, the pop-up continues from 11am to 6pm on August 8, 10 and 11, and from 11am to 4pm on August 9. The Campy!bar collaboration starts at 7pm each night. Tickets for Friday start at ¥2,000 (incl. 1 drink) and go up to ¥5,000 for VIP.

Presented by Komiyama and Sabukaru, ‘The Japanese Tattoo’ explores the history and living culture of wabori through photography, archival materials and traditional works. The exhibition centres on three figures who have shaped Japanese tattooing across different generations. Horihide played a major role in introducing Japanese tattooing to the wider world, building relationships with artists including Sailor Jerry and Don Ed Hardy. Asakusa Horikazu represents the technical skill, craftsmanship and cultural weight of traditional wabori, while Horicho II continues the respected Horicho lineage and its commitment to tebori. The exhibition is curated by cultural researcher and journalist Manami ‘Maki’ Okazaki, whose decades of work have documented Japanese subcultures through extensive research, personal relationships and a deep archive. Rather than treating tattooing as a finished image alone, the exhibition looks at the wider culture surrounding it: the techniques passed down between artists, the rituals of the studio, the communities built around the craft and the histories carried on the body. A programme of related events will also take place during the exhibition, including a live tattooing session by Horicho II on July 4 and a conversation with Horihide and Manami Okazaki on July 11. ‘The Japanese Tattoo’ runs from July 4 to July 20 2026, at Komiyama Tokyo G.

Not to be confused with Iriya near Ueno, this Iriya is in Adachi – and it has a strange, bone-coloured squid-like playground structure that looks like a fossil, a shell, a spaceship and a sea creature all at once. Adachi is famous among playground obsessives for its many ‘tako-san’ slides, but Iriya Central Park is special because it has an ‘ika-san’ slide: a squid, not an octopus.The park is larger than some of the tiny novelty playgrounds on this list, with a multipurpose ground, play area, swings, a sandpit and standard equipment alongside the sculptural slide. That makes it better for actual playing.

Every neighbourhood deserves a resident robot. Oji 6-chome Children’s Playground, also known locally as Robot Park, is watched over by a big blue retro robot whose arms double as playground equipment. One arm works as the stairs, the other as the slide, and the head becomes a cockpit-like platform where small children can live out their pilot fantasy. Gundam, anyone?Besides the bot there’s more standard playground pieces too, including swings, a sandpit and bars, but the robot is obviously the main character. It has the chunky, slightly handmade look of a children’s TV prop from another era – not slick, and absolutely better for it. It’s good for kids, obviously, but also for anyone who enjoys Tokyo’s quieter residential oddities: the kind of thing you would never find unless someone told you it existed.

Tachikawa’s Oni Park does not ease you in. Its centrepiece is a giant red demon head with striped horns, heavy brows and an open mouth that children can run straight into. It is part slide, part monster, part public nightmare in the cutest possible way. From the right angle, it looks like the park has been swallowed by folklore, ready to devour you up. Officially called Nishiki Second Park, this is one of the more famous parks on the list. It has appeared in pop culture, including scenes connected to manga/dramas: Saint Young Men, Gokusen and Nagi’s Long Vacation. The oni is loud, theatrical and very shootable, especially if you want something with more personality than the usual ‘pretty park’ background.

Banana Park is exactly what it sounds like and somehow still funnier in person. Hidden in a residential part of Nerima, the park is built around a large yellow banana-shaped play structure, with banana benches and smaller banana-themed pieces. This is not a huge destination park with endless facilities, so don’t come expecting a full day of entertainment. Its charm is in how specific it is. A banana slide in a quiet Tokyo neighbourhood is already enough. It’s perfect for a short photo stop, a tiny detour with kids, or anyone building a personal archive of Tokyo’s strangest public design decisions. Bonus points if you bring an actual banana from the conbini and eat it there.

Homeys first built its name with burgers before opening its hot dog stand in Kagurazaka, bringing the same American diner mood into a smaller, more glizzy-focused format. The shop is best known for strange, spectacular flavour combinations that you probably won’t find anywhere else in Tokyo. Its specialty is stacked flavours, the kind of hot dog that feels less like a quick snack and more like going to a theme park where every ride involves a splash mountain of flavour. The buns are worth mentioning too. Homeys serves its dogs on black and red buns using cacao and cayenne pepper, which started as a playful Halloween thing before becoming part of the regular menu. The nacho dog is the one to get, served on your choice of black or red bun. It has the fun, slightly ridiculous feeling a good loaded hot dog should have, but it still feels put together rather than chaotic. Homeys wants to make hot dogs feel more like a proper gourmet option in Tokyo, not just a snack you buy when nothing else is open. The coloured bun helps, obviously. A normal beige bun could never.

Tokyo has gourmet dogs, art dogs and heavily engineered dogs, but sometimes the best one is still a man, a grill and a bun. Kajuru Kenny, better known around Harajuku and Kabukicho as the hot dog cart guy, has been selling New York-style hot dogs for around 20 years. His setup is simple: an open-concept food truck, grilled sausages, soft buns and no unnecessary decoration. The staple hot dog is ¥600, handed straight from the grill to your hand, and that is most of the charm. Kenny is humble about it too. His pitch is basically: if you taste it, you’ll like it. No foam, no microgreens, no overthinking. Just a hot dog that tastes like a hot dog, which in Tokyo can feel weirdly rare. Follow him on Instagram to track where he is – usually between Harajuku, Kabukicho and the occasional event.

C.O.D stands for Cash on Delivery, though these days the name is more of a relic than a payment warning. The Kita-Aoyama shop has been open for around 40 years, which is exactly how it became the laid-back hot dog institution it is today: experience. The space has a loose California garage feel, with events, a DJ booth and a nighttime bar setup that closes whenever the person behind the bar decides the night is over. The dogs here lean more Tex-Mex than ballpark classic, with loaded toppings and a slightly messy, very satisfying energy. Go for the chilli cheese dog: warm, heavy, saucy and exactly the kind of thing you want when you’re pretending summer in Tokyo is less brutal than it is.

Doggs is a hot dog shop covered in Americana-style LED decor, run by Ary, a rapper who also goes by Stpaulers. The shop has been in Ekoda since 2015, serving handmade sausages inspired by America while keeping everything grounded in its own local community. On some weekends, Doggs hosts block parties outside the shop, turning the street into part of the experience. The sausages are handmade with domestic pork and no additives, and the menu stretches from New York-style classics to heavier BBQ-leaning options. The Queen’s BBQ is the special recommendation, but the plain dog might be the most serious one if you want to understand the base.

Skookum opened in 2021 with a pretty clear mission: make hot dogs feel like something worth travelling for. The owner previously worked in the hamburger world, but after seeing how many burger places already existed, wanted to do something with a little more surprise. The result is an artisan hot dog diner in Nakameguro where the sausage gets treated with the kind of attention usually reserved for much more serious food. The process involves smoking, drying, frying and boiling, with a lot of trial and error behind each dog. The idea is still easy eating, but the flavour is more layered than the usual bun-plus-sausage-plus-sauce formula. The namesake Skookum dog is the one to get, generously topped with house-made char siu-esque bacon, cheddar cheese, avocado, tomato, onion, lettuce, house-made BBQ sauce and tartar sauce. The word ‘skookum’ comes from Chinook Jargon and carries meanings like strong, powerful and impressive – which is a pretty intense name for a hot dog, but in this case, fair.

Opened in March 2026 inside Harajuku Quest, The Tunnel is a new food, music and culture spot from En One Tokyo, the team behind some of Harajuku’s coolest galleries, restaurants and hangouts. The space is designed like a real service area, bringing together different kinds of food, people and reasons to linger under one theme. Only here, the theme is less family road trip and more Harajuku culture tunnel with a sound system. Inside, you’ll find casual snacks crafted with culinary expertise, drinks, a soundproof setup and a hall in the back for exhibitions, pop-ups and events. It has the easy feeling of somewhere you can stop by quickly, but the cultural wiring of a place that will probably end up hosting half the neighbourhood’s DJs, artists and food people at some point. Go for a quick bite, stay for whatever is happening in the back, or just make it your default Harajuku pit stop when you don’t know where else to go. As they put it: とりあえずTunnelで.

Jimbocho has no shortage of ways to lose an afternoon. Its pavements spill over with secondhand books, century-old shopfronts sit beside modern coffee counters, and almost every doorway seems to lead to another niche collection. It is a neighbourhood that rewards taking your time – and paying attention to the small things. Earlier this year, the Jimbocho-based Hobonichi team guided us around three of the area’s best stationery shops. This time, we returned the favour. They brought along a blank Hobonichi Techo and we took them to three of our favourite local spots, filling the journal’s pages as we went. The idea wasn’t to make a perfect itinerary. Instead, we wanted to see what the neighbourhood would look like once it had been reduced to notes, photographs, colours and the strange little objects that caught our attention along the way. Here’s where we went. (Former) Tsuruya Tailor Photo: Keisuke Tanigawa(Former) Tsuruya Tailor Our first stop was (Former) Tsuruya Tailor, a shop that reveals almost nothing from its name. The building was constructed in 1928 in the kanban kenchiku style, a type of early Showa-era shophouse architecture with a Western-inspired façade. It once housed a bespoke menswear business that continued for three generations; today, the former tailor’s niece has turned it into one of Jimbocho’s most delightfully unclassifiable shops. Photo: Keisuke Tanigawa(Former) Tsuruya Tailor Inside, vintage books, clothing, tableware, accessories and Showa-era cur

By Saturday morning, the walkways surrounding Tokyo Big Sight will be filled with people carrying annotated maps, numbered shopping lists and enough electrolyte powder to supply a minor endurance sport. Comiket veterans do not simply wander around and see what looks good. They plot routes. They know which artist sells out first, which hall to enter through and exactly how much cash is sitting in each pocket. For a first-timer, watching this level of preparation can make Comic Market feel like arriving to an exam nobody told you to study for. Comic Market 108 – better known as C108 or Summer Comiket – takes over Tokyo Big Sight on August 15 and 16 with more than 22,000 creator spaces across two days. The corporate booths and armies of cosplayers may be its most visible parts, but Comiket is built around its circles: individual creators and groups selling doujin, or independently made manga, illustration books, games, music, criticism, photography, software and works so aggressively specific that no normal shop could ever justify giving them shelf space. The good news is that you do not need to develop a colour-coded military operation overnight. You do, however, need the correct wristband, the correct day, a basic route and a plan for Tokyo’s humidity – plus the rain currently threatening the weekend. You are late, but you are not doomed. Here’s how to sort everything out from your bed, with a phone and a rapidly shrinking amount of time. Get your admission sorted now Comiket

Some people leave Osaka with a box of takoyaki-flavoured snacks. Others would rather immortalise themselves inside the visual aesthetic of a discount supermarket. Super Tamade now has both groups covered. The Osaka grocery chain – famous for rock-bottom prices and storefronts so aggressively neon that they make Don Quijote look restrained – has installed its own original purikura photo booth at its Shinsekai store. Announced on July 31, the machine comes with ten Super Tamade-exclusive frames, all drenched in the chain's unmistakable yellow, red and rainbow-coloured branding. photo via supertamade.co.jp InstagramAvailable purikura frames There are two ways to commit yourself to the bit: a standard photo sheet costs ¥700, while an oversized version is ¥1,100. Unlike the usual beauty-filtered purikura booth hiding in the corner of an arcade, this one is less about pretending you have enormous eyes and more about leaving Osaka looking like you have been personally sponsored by the city's most chaotic supermarket. Super Tamade has been around since 1978 and built its name as one of Osaka's best-known discount grocery chains, historically famous for ultra-cheap promotions and a visual identity closer to a pachinko parlour than a neighbourhood supermarket. In recent years, that look has become almost as recognisable as the bargains themselves. Its Shinsekai branch, which opened in April 2026 a few minutes from Dobutsuen-mae Station, leans especially hard into that cult status. C

Festival food around the world is famed for its willingness to take a dare: deep-fried, deep-fried again, fused with something it probably should never have met and, finally, buried under cheese. Japan will always have its beloved matsuri staples – sauce-glossed yakisoba, takoyaki hot enough to remove the roof of your mouth – but some vendors have become destinations on the festival circuit in their own right. Fuji Rock is no exception. Spread across 11 food areas, the festival’s 2026 food line-up brought together local Niigata institutions, cult restaurants and travelling kitchens from across Japan. Taking a break from the music, we attempted a five-stop food tour in a single day. Read on for the dishes that survived the mud, the crowds and our increasingly questionable capacity – plus where to find the people behind them now that Fuji Rock is over. Spice Stand 556, Osaka: jerk chicken over rice Osaka’s Spice Stand 556 specialises in globally minded spice cooking, pulling ideas from South India, Jamaica and New York without turning the final plate into a confused fusion experiment. Its jerk chicken over rice combines Jamaican-style chicken with the structure of New York’s beloved halal-cart staple. Fragrant jasmine rice came loaded with chicken, cooling white sauce, chilli sauce and South Indian-inspired sides. The chicken had actual heat rather than decorative spiciness, with smoky edges and seasoning that carried all the way through. The sauces kept each bite sharp, creamy

It's the day before Fuji Rock and the FOMO is hitting so hard you've decided to just try your luck. No ticket, no hotel, no plan, just vibes and a vague sense that you'll figure it out in the mountains. Respectfully, you will not figure it out in the mountains. But you can figure it out right now, from your bed, with one day and a phone. Here's our full last-minute survival guide. Get your ticket Start at the official site and see what's actually left, because availability moves fast this close to the date. At the time of writing, Friday and Sunday one-day tickets and Friday Night tickets are still available, while Saturday and three-day tickets are sold out. If the ticket you need is gone, Ticket Jam and Ticket Ryutsu Center are third-party resale platforms where people sometimes list Fuji Rock tickets. Neither is an official Fuji Rock resale partner, so check the ticket format, transfer conditions and seller history before you pay. Mercari is not an automatic no-go either: electronic tickets are prohibited there, but some eligible paper tickets can be listed. If you strike out everywhere else, the last resort is the usual Facebook ticket exchange groups. Scammers love a festival with one day of runway left, so never send money before you've seen proof of the ticket, and meet in person or use buyer protection wherever you can. One move you may see floating around is Yuzawa Town's furusato nozei programme. Unfortunately, the admission and travel bundles are no longer a last-m

For most of the last century, Japanese tattooing lived a kind of double life. Irezumi, or wabori, carried centuries of technique and symbolism – full body suits built from folklore and hand poked over hundreds of hours – and it also carried a stigma heavy enough to keep most of that work hidden under long sleeves. That's starting to shift, and Jimbocho's Komiyama Tokyo is marking the moment with a new show. ‘The Japanese Tattoo’, presented by Komiyama and the culture site Sabukaru, opened on July 4 and is running through July 20 at Komiyama Tokyo G. Rather than treating tattoos as finished images to admire on a wall, the exhibition builds its case around the culture behind them: the techniques passed hand to hand between master and apprentice, the ritual of the studio, the communities that form around the craft, and the histories people choose to carry on their skin. The show centres on three tattooers spanning different generations of the same tradition. Horihide helped introduce Japanese tattooing to the rest of the world, building relationships with foundational Western tattoo figures like Sailor Jerry and Don Ed Hardy along the way. Asakusa Horikazu represents the technical precision and cultural gravity of wabori at its most exacting. And Horicho II carries forward the respected Horicho lineage, still committed to tebori, the hand poking method that predates the tattoo machine entirely. Curating all of it is Manami ‘Maki’ Okazaki, a cultural researcher and journalist who

Tokyo, humid dusk, Billboard Live glowing like a chapel someone built inside a shopping mall. Erykah Badu walks out in what looks like a rose bush mid religious awakening, a Tomo Koizumi jacket blooming red and pink over a puffy-white afro centric hood. The room stops clapping and starts holding its breath instead. ‘Costumes are part of the improvisation, just like the music,’ she'd say later. Nothing about this show was pre decided. That's the whole premise of IMEHO, her new project with longtime collaborator RC Williams: Improvisation, no script, just voice, piano, and percussion – a Tokyo exclusive that had bongos rattling under the room like a second heartbeat. Japan is its world debut, the first breath of something that migrates to Europe in October. Photo: Kohei KawashimaErykah Performs wearing Tomo Koizumi Calling it a concert undersells it. This was church. Orange and blue light washed the stage like stained glass caught at golden hour, and Williams' chords rolled out with the same weight as a Hammond organ mid sermon. Badu commanded the crowd, pulling everyone into a call and response nobody could resist. You don't watch an Erykah Badu show. You get preached to, gently, and you thank her for it.Every note got held onto like it might not come back around. Then ‘On & On’ hit and the room forgot itself entirely, up out of their seats, harmonising with Williams like it was choir practice and Sunday best.Badu never broke focus. Present tense only, gracious every time sh

Every summer, for three days, a ski resort two hours outside Tokyo turns into the closest thing Japan has to a religious pilgrimage for music people. Fuji Rock started in 1997 as a chaotic, storm battered one-off near Mt Fuji, moved to Naeba Ski Resort in Niigata two years later, and has been building myth ever since. The slopes that carry skiers all winter turn into a sprawling network of stages tucked into forest and riverbank, connected by wooden walkways that somehow never feel as far apart as they actually are. People camp for days, soak in the onsen between sets, and wander into secret woodland shows that nobody announces until the day of. It rains constantly and nobody seems to mind. Twenty-nine years in, it's still the festival every other Japanese festival is quietly trying to be. This year's edition runs July 24 to 26, and the anticipation's been building since the first line-up drop back in February. Three-day tickets sold out well ahead of the festival, single day passes are going fast, and the line-up itself is doing something Fuji Rock does better than almost anyone: mixing generational headliners with the kind of deep cuts that reward people willing to wander off the main stages. There's a real sense this year that the bill skews younger and stranger than usual without losing the legacy acts that make the festival feel like an institution. If you're only making it to Naeba once this decade, this might be the year to do it.Naturally, the top of the poster is alr

On July 10, Ultra Mart Tokyo opens in Harajuku as the first permanent store dedicated to the Ultraman universe. July 10 also happens to be Ultraman Day, marking the anniversary of the 1966 event that introduced the silver giant to the world before his first TV episode aired. Sixty years later, Tsuburaya Productions is giving him a proper address. Built around the concept of ‘The Crossroads of the Future and Harajuku’, Ultra Mart Tokyo will host rotating themes, collaborations and limited-edition drops, meaning the version you visit on opening week probably won’t be the same one you find a few months later. First up is ‘Ultra Cute’, a launch collaboration with Mofusand, the extremely beloved cat illustration brand. The main exclusive is a Mofusand x Ultraman plush dressed as Ultraman Tiga, who celebrates his 30th anniversary this year. The plush will be sold by lottery for ¥2,530, and anyone who buys something in store will receive a limited-edition sticker while supplies last. The space itself is built for the camera roll. A roughly three-metre-tall Ultraman Tiga statue stands at the entrance, surrounded by mirrored surfaces, video and lighting that make the whole store feel like it’s folding in on itself – big Sorayama vibes here. Outside, a giant screen called the Ultra Window brings the world of Ultraman onto the Harajuku street, because apparently even kaiju need to go digital. From opening day until August 2, Ultraman and various Ultra Monsters will also appear in store

Prada and Gentle Monster have announced their first collaborative collection, bringing together two brands that understand the power of looking slightly out of this world. Rather than simply placing two logos on a pair of sunglasses, the collaboration feels more like a meeting of atmospheres. Prada’s controlled elegance is filtered through Gentle Monster’s cinematic, hyper-surreal lens, resulting in a collection that plays with light, structure and drama. The line-up features three eyewear designs, each built around sculptural lens shapes, three-dimensional details across the front and Gentle Monster’s titanium temples, finished with Prada’s iconic triangle logo. The silhouettes are polished but strange, refined but slightly unreal – the kind of sunglasses that look like they belong equally in a Milan showroom and inside a dream sequence. The campaign, starring actor and Prada ambassador Kentaro Sakaguchi, leans fully into that feeling. Built around the concept of books, the visuals blur the boundary between reality and imagination, with five surreal forces – earth, water, fire, air and love – released from the fingertips. Gentle Monster has become quite known for its fashion campaigns that look like short films rather than straightforward advertisements, and this collaboration is no exception. The result is a small cinematic universe: elegant, mysterious and charged with the feeling that something has just opened. Photo: Iicombined Japan Co., Ltd.Pop-up at Prada Aoyama To

Over the last few days, Shibuya has been hosting a Hunter Exam of its own. To commemorate Hunter x Hunter surpassing 100 million copies in circulation, publisher Shueisha has launched a special campaign titled ‘Shibuya Hunter-gai’, turning the neighbourhood into the venue for a treasure hunt. The campaign also coincides with the release of the manga’s latest volume, Volume 39, which arrives in Japan on July 3. From June 29 to July 5, a total of 115 characters from Yoshihiro Togashi’s legendary series appear across Shibuya as outdoor ads, hidden placements and QR-code-linked character sightings. The official campaign frames the whole thing in true Hunter x Hunter fashion: characters are hiding in the city using Zetsu, the Nen technique used to suppress one’s presence. Your job, naturally, is to use Gyo – the technique of focusing aura into the eyes – and find them. Time Out Technically, the hunt has already been solved. The official character list now shows 115 out of 115 sightings found, meaning the full map has been uncovered by faster, stronger and probably much better prepared Hunters than the rest of us. But that doesn’t mean the game is over. If anything, this is now the perfect time to test yourself without immediately checking the answers. Wander through Shibuya, keep your eyes open around Center-gai, Dogenzaka, Tower Records, Mega Don Quijote and the surrounding streets, and see how many characters you can spot before giving in and consulting the official list. For

Bandwagoner, die-hard fan or just here for the shared delusion of a room full of strangers screaming at a screen, there’s no escaping FIFA fever right now. The World Cup has been rolling through Tokyo one kick-off at a time, turning pubs into temporary embassies, cinemas into stadiums and a 1pm match into a perfectly reasonable excuse for a pint. Whether you want to support your home team, cheer on Japan with a crowd, warm up a bar stool or go full Bend It Like Beckham on an actual pitch afterwards, here’s where to watch the games and where to play one of your own. Where to watch The Footnik, Ebisu and OsakiA Tokyo football-viewing classic, The Footnik is exactly the kind of British pub you want when a match needs noise, beer and someone in the corner who knows far too much about group-stage mathematics. Both the Ebisu and Osaki locations are showing a heavy World Cup schedule, with reservations available online for bigger fixtures and some walk-in seating possible when matches are quieter. For Japan’s June 21 match against Tunisia, the pub is going all in, with paid standing and reserved-seat packages that include free-flow drinks. Don’t leave without ordering the fish and chips, which are basically part of the Footnik viewing ritual at this point.Address: Asahi Bldg 1F, 1-11-2 Ebisu, Shibuya (Ebisu); ThinkPark Bldg 1F, 2-1-1 Osaki, Shinagawa (Osaki) Good to know: Match schedules and reservation prices vary by fixture. Japan vs Tunisia is scheduled for June 21 at 1pm. Hobgob