Hotel Papion

Hotel Papion has been open for 36 years, gone through two full renewals, and despite that still carries the retro nostalgia loved by all who seek out Tokyo's downtown. The themed rooms include two with functioning grand pianos – professional-grade, to the extent that actual musicians come into practice – but the chamber most people come for is the retro car room, a full recreation of a classic automobile interior where you can sit in the driver's seat and go absolutely nowhere.

Uber Eats delivers directly to the room, which makes sense: you're already on an imaginary road trip, you may as well eat. The themed rooms can't be reserved in advance and get busy on weekends, so aim for a weekday if a specific room is the goal. The hotel actively welcomes photo shoots and is happy about the fact that people's relationship to love hotels is changing. The whole point, they say, is to create the feeling of being overseas without leaving the middle of Tokyo.