Things to do in Tokyo this week

Immerse yourself in a sake-tasting adventure this October at one of Tokyo's premier sake festivals. Held three times a year, Washu Fes celebrates the culture and tradition of sake-making. For the festival's 26th edition, 43 breweries from around Japan will set up shop in Nakameguro, where you can sample over 250 varieties of sake. Some of the participating sake makers such as Asahara Brewery and Iwase Sake Brewing are based around the Kanto region, while others hail from faraway prefectures like Akita or Yamaguchi.

Types of sake selected for the summer cover a wide range from chilled sparkling and fruity ginjo-shu to unpasteurised namazake and cloudy nigori sake. If you find something you like, you’ll be able to purchase full bottles of your favourite sake on-site.

Besides sake tasting, the festival's programme will feature performances including a Shakuhachi flute and koto showcase. Tasting tickets for residents living in Japan are ¥3,300 on Yahoo Passmarket and tasting tickets for tourists with foreign credit cards are ¥4,400 on Stripe. The ticket includes a tasting cup, a sake textbook, and a wooden sake cup to take home. With limited spaces available, it's wise to arrive early (reception starts 15 minutes before opening).

Enjoy the lovely autumn weather at the Tokyo Night Market near Shibuya Crossing. Here you can expect a variety of street food alongside live performances and art exhibitions, with DJs on deck to set the mood all day till 10pm.

Held at Yoyogi Park’s Keyaki event space for five consecutive nights from October 23 to October 27, the third iteration of this event is expected to be bigger than ever. The previous Tokyo Night Market in May featured an impressive number of Shibuya-based spinners and artists including The Church bar DJs Da Yama, Yoshi Kanou and kulage. 

While details for the night market's autumn edition are yet to be announced, be sure to check the event's Instagram for the latest updates.

Tokyo Night Market runs from 4pm to 10pm on Wednesday through Friday, and from 12noon to 10pm over the weekend.

It's not difficult to guess how Enoshima's landmark tower got its name. With its white facade and cylindrical structure, the Sea Candle observation tower is a fantastic place to catch a 360-degree view of Enoshima's coast and surrounding seaside towns. This autumn, however, the towering torch won't be the island's only candle.

From October 20 to November 4, roughly 10,000 wax candles will be placed along Enoshima Sunset Terrace and lit up to illuminate the promenade leading to the tower. Weather permitting, the candles will be there every evening from 5pm, though an announcement will be posted at around 12noon on the event website if the illumination has to be cancelled.

A large-scale tea ceremony where even those who aren’t familiar with the custom are welcome to participate. The event will be held at the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum on Saturday October 19 and Sunday October 20, and the weekend after at the Hamarikyu Gardens on October 26 and 27.

There are different tea ceremonies held between 10am and 4.15pm, and sessions cost ¥800 per person (¥500 for the children’s session). While the indoor tea ceremony in Japanese is already booked out, the English sessions can be booked at the venue on the day itself. 

Aside from the tea ceremonies, you’ll find plenty of other cultural programmes including live performances of daikagura (ceremonial dance), kendama, gagaku (Japanese classical music), and more at the Hamarikyu Gardens venue.

Check the website to see what’s on at each venue. Entrance to the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum is free during the event.

Komazawa Olympic Park is hosting a ramen festival with over a dozen booths serving Japanese noodles from different prefectures. You can go for a simple shoyu (soy sauce) or shio (salt) ramen, or a bowl with rich tonkotsu pork broth, or one topped generously with beef. Be warned though: some stalls are expected to have up to two hours wait time, as they are exclusive to the festival or have won the Ramen Grand Prix in recent years.

The event is split into three parts, each with a different set of vendors. The ramen restaurants that are participating in the first part (October 24 to 27) include Katsuryu from Ibaraki prefecture with its rich paitan (cloudy white chicken broth) ramen topped with uni, and Kaga Miso Menyūkai from Ishikawa prefecture, whose signature miso ramen is a voluminous bowl topped with seared pork belly.

The second part (October 28 to 31) features Hokkaido prefecture's Tsunatori Monogatari with its slightly spicy signature miso noodles with grilled braised pork and char siu pork, and Kasaoka Ramen Ichigendo from Okayama prefecture with its rich shoyu-based broth and generous toppings of green onion and sliced roast chicken.

Lastly, the third part (November 1 to 4) features Oita prefecture's Hakuryu with its rich tonkotsu (pork-based) soup, as well as Shinshu Menyukai from Nagano prefecture serving up hot and spicy tantanmen noodles.

In short, you’ll find every kind of ramen that your heart desires at Tokyo Ramen Festa. Admission is free while a bowl of noodles costs ¥1,000. Meal tickets can be purchased at Seven Eleven outlets nationwide in advance or at the venue. We highly recommend purchasing tickets earlier rather than later, as it can run out towards the end of the day.

The festival runs from 10.30am to 8.30pm, with the exception of October 27, October 31 and November 4, when it closes at 6pm.

Dai Tsukemen Haku (or Big Tsukemen Expo) will be held at Okubo Park between Kabukicho and Shin-Okubo in Shinjuku. The daily changing lineup of shops – a total of 40 vendors from all over Japan – will serve their noodle creations (ramen, tsukemen and abura soba) for almost a month from October 10 to November 6.

Stalls of Tokyo-based restaurants include Ore no Ikiru Michi, Menya Nakagawakai and Japanese Spice Curry Wacca, just to name a few. One bowl of noodles costs ¥1,000.

Mt Takao is one of the most picturesque destinations in Tokyo to see autumn leaves. And one of the best ways to do that is by taking the scenic cable car ride, which brings you closer to the mountain’s Yakuoin temple. Here you can sample shojin ryori, a traditional Japanese Buddhist vegetarian meal.

Throughout the duration of the festival, you can also look forward to a host of free events at Kiyotaki Station, the cable car stop at the base of Mt Takao, including musical and dance performances by local university students. Check the website for the schedule.

As it’s the case every year, the base of Mt Takao will be crowded in autumn, so it’s best to arrive via public transport.

Kagurazaka is coming alive with a variety of activities happening between October 12 and November 3. Its main ‘“Painting on the Hill” event on November 3 is returning this year for the 26th time. The entire 700 metre-long Kagurazaka-dori street will be lined with a long roll of white paper for everyone to draw and paint on for free. Painting tools and equipment will be provided every few metres so you can contribute to this piece of community art. Even if you can’t be here in person, you can participate online by drawing on your smartphone. Your work will then be printed out and pasted onto the paper.

On October 27, visit Zenkokuji Temple for the Kagurazaka Art Square. Local artists will exhibit their work from paintings, calligraphy and illustrations to installations, paper cutouts, photography and prints. Visitors, however, are encouraged to vote for their favourite pieces from 10am to 4pm. 

Japan’s largest Hungarian culture festival is happening at Odaiba’s Symbol Promenade Park Central Square. While held only for one day on October 26, the event is a chance to immerse yourself in Hungarian culture. There will be outdoor music performances, stalls selling Hungarian delicacies, and a fashion show.

Expect to see a captivating piano recital by Hungarian pianist and composer Káel Nobert, and a folk music performance by the Naszály band at the outdoor stage. Don’t miss the fashion show by Hungarian designer Tünde Hrivnák, who incorporates Hungarian embroidery techniques to create colourful folk dresses.

In the event of inclement weather, the festival will be postponed to October 27.

Matcha lovers will want to make a beeline for this week-long pop-up at Tokyu Plaza Harajuku Harakado. Operating as a travelling tea house, Rocky's Matcha frequently hosts pop-ups at marquee events around the world, including Art Basel, Paris Fashion Week, ComplexCon and more.

Finally making its way to Tokyo, Rocky's Matcha will be serving up its signature assortment of matcha-based drinks made with the brand's ceremonial-grade tea leaves. Highlights from the menu include the matcha and hojicha latte (¥650 each) and Rocky's matcha gelato (2 scoops for ¥1,100) made in collaboration with Patisserie Asako Iwayanagi. 

In addition to drinks, Rocky's Matcha has also teamed up with fashion label Sacai to offer an exclusive capsule collection which you can only find at the pop-up café. The collection includes a black hoodie (¥39,600) and white T-shirt (¥19,800) with the Rocky Matcha logo.

This annual event might just be the best time to explore Tokyo’s vibrant cocktail scene. This year, Tokyo Cocktail 7Days is running from October 17 to 27 and more than 90 bars are set to participate. With a special cocktail passport, you can bar-hop around Tokyo’s world-renowned bars such as Bar BenFiddich and The SG Tavern, and enjoy special cocktails created by talented bartenders at a set price of ¥1,300 per drink. While this special price is limited to selected drinks that are created specifically for this occasion, you can use the ¥1,300 coupon that comes with the aforementioned passport to redeem for any drink at a participating bar.

In addition to bar-hopping, the passport also gives you access to the Village, at Port Hall Takeshiba on October 19 and 20. This pop-up space will feature ten popular bars from around Tokyo, and the passport will get you five free drinks at the venue. You can also attend seminars and workshops to listen to acclaimed bartenders and learn about the art of making cocktails.

Whether you are a cocktail aficionado or just starting to dip your feet into Tokyo’s bar culture, this is a good deal to help you get immersed in Tokyo’s world-class drinking scene.

Tickets can be purchased online through the event website.

Futako Tamagawa shopping centre Rise is celebrating Halloween over the October 26-27 weekend with a host of family-friendly activities. While there's no parade, you’ll find photobooths, workshops and plenty of stalls offering spooky treats. Kids will surely love riding the double decker trolley bus, which will be going around the shopping centre's central plaza. There will even be a Halloween-themed bouncy castle. 

School gymnasiums, churches, office lobbies, coffee shops and shrines are all considered fair game for a spot of music during Asagaya Jazz Streets, a two-day festival in which concerts are held at dozens of locations scattered across the neighbourhood.

The event has been slowly growing in stature since starting out in 1995. As has become customary, veteran piano innovator Yosuke Yamashita hits up Shinmeiguu Shrine once again for the main event – this time together with bassist Kosuke Sakai, drummer Shuya Honda and trumpeter Shinpei Ruya. Meanwhile, concerts by the likes of the Yoshiaki Masuo Group and all female Tokyo Brass Style Jazz unit are also sure to draw big crowds.

Note that while the open-air gigs are free, you'll need a paid wristband to get into most of the participating venues, while a drink or food order is required at many of the shows held in cafés and restaurants.

Check the event website for performance schedules and ticketing information.

The Sumi-Yume project, a local initiative promoting art, dance and crafts inspired by the great ukiyo-e artist Hokusai and the Sumida River, is hosting its ninth annual festival from September 1 to December 22. Held across multiple venues along the aforementioned waterway, the festival aims to revitalise the neighbourhoods surrounding the Sumida River through the arts including dance, theatre and film.

You can partake in a new style of Bon Odori dance as portrayed by Hokusai in his ukiyo-e print. This will take place on October 26 from 2pm to 8pm at the Sumida Park Soyokaze Square. During the day, you can also enjoy a variety of stage performances by local artists, such as folk music, DJ mixing, hip-hop and more.

Also, don’t miss the outdoor cinema taking over Lattest Sports on October 11 and the Sumida Park Soyokaze Square on October 12 and 13. While the screening schedule has yet to be announced on the event website, you can expect movies such as ‘Perfect Days’, ‘Sing Street’ and ‘Paddington’.

Sumi-Yume is set to announce many more publicly commissioned works soon. Be sure to check the website for the latest updates.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government No. 1 Building in Shinjuku now serves as the backdrop for a jaw-dropping and record-breaking projection mapping show. Covering an area of a whopping 13,905sqm, the after-dark spectacle has been certified by Guinness World Records as the largest permanent display of its kind in the world.

The nightly showcase features a range of visual wonders created by a mix of local and international artists. Some shows are inspired by Tokyo's rich history, while others draw on themes like the lunar cycle. 

Currently, on weeknights, you can catch ‘Evolution’, ‘Lunar Cycle’, 'Synergy', 'Poetic Structures' and 'Golden Fortune'. Additionally, there’s a new show that's just been introduced called ‘Butai ni tatte’, which is synchronised to a song by hit Japanese pop duo Yoasobi. On weekends, you can look forward to a showcase featuring 'Godzilla: Attack on Tokyo!', the aforementioned ‘Butai ni tatte (Yoasobi)’ as well as ‘Tokyo Concerto', a display featuring Tokyo attractions alongside music.

Shows take place every night from 7.30pm to 9.45pm. For more details and to check the full programme of daily projection mapping shows, visit here.

Immersive theatre group Dazzle Dance Company is set to deliver its inaugural performance of ‘Anemoia Tokyo’ on October 11. The semi-permanent production will be bigger than the production house’s previous works, and it’s an international collaboration with nine visionary artists from Japan and abroad.

This non-verbal theatre experience, set in a mysterious train platform hidden near Tokyo Station, takes audiences on an ethereal train ride to a different world. Anemoia Tokyo will be unlike any traditional theatre where the audience is separated from the actors. Here, the production promises to offer an immersive experience where the audience is integrated into the narrative and transported into the story.

Tickets are currently on sale online, with prices starting from ¥15,000. The location of the venue will be disclosed only to ticket holders.

Shows on weekdays and Saturdays start at 4pm, 6.30pm and 9pm. Sunday and holiday shows start at 1.30pm, 4pm and 6.30pm.

The world-famous German beer festival returns to the open plaza in front of Meiji Memorial Hall for the first time in 19 years this September. Running for 20 days, the Jingu Gaien Oktoberfest will see live Oompah band performances and generous servings of German beer, brewed in and imported especially from Germany for the event. There are no further details at the time of writing, so check the event website for updates.

Entry is ¥1,000. Food and drinks can be purchased with major credit cards and contactless payments.

Tokyo’s charming neighbourhood of Jimbocho is commonly referred to as Jimbocho Book Town, thanks to the overwhelming number of antique bookstores lining the streets. If you want to learn more about this fascinating area and the history behind its long-standing bookstores, sign up for one of these six free seminars offering an in-depth look at Japanese publishing and secondhand bookshops around Jimbocho. 

Seminar speakers include Masaki Kobayashi, the editor-in-chief of Modern Publishing Studies, Harvard alum Susan Taylor who conducts research in Jimbocho, and Chikahiko Suzuki, an associate professor from Gunma Women's University.

The lectures are bilingual (Japanese and English) while the Q&A sessions are multilingual via a smart phone system.

The seminar is free, but you must sign up for a ticket online in advance.

In teamLab's new pop-up exhibition in collaboration with the Galaxy store in Harajuku, the digital art collective's enchanted forest has been transformed into an underwater fantasy. This latest installation is also an interactive one, where visitors can use smartphones to catch, study and release the colourful sea creatures they encounter in the space. There's a great variety of marine animals to see, including fish like tuna as well as aquatic creatures that are endangered or extinct. 

To catch a creature to study it, you can use the designated app on a Galaxy smartphone to scan fish swimming in the space, or throw out a 'Study Net' towards the floor if you see something interesting darting around your feet. 

Each session is an hour-long, with daily exhibitions open from 11am until 7pm. 

Note: an end date for this exhibition has yet to be announced.

If you’re looking for the most OTT illumination in Tokyo, this is it. Yomiuri Land's annual winter light show will bedazzle even the most jaded illumination-fiend. As the name suggests, jewels are the focus here: literally millions of colourful LEDs are set up throughout the vast theme park evoking sparkling gems. The park is split into ten areas where you will be treated to beautifully lit attractions. 

In addition to the rainbow-lit, 180-metre-long Celebration Promenade and Crystal Passage, you’ll spot two gigantic sparkly Ferris wheels to mark the amusement park's 60th anniversary. The highlight, however, is the fountain show, with water illuminated in different colours and sprayed into the air to create stunning shapes. There are three kinds of show happening every 15 minutes from 5pm daily. Also look out for the fountain’s flames and lasers, which are synchronised to music.

French-born artist Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) has long loomed large over Roppongi Hills: her outdoor sculpture of a gigantic spider, named ‘Maman’, is a local landmark. The sprawling development’s Mori Art Museum, then, is a fitting venue for this major retrospective of one of the most important artists of the past century. As explored by Bourgeois’ first large-scale Japanese solo exhibition in over 25 years, fear was an ongoing motivation over her seven-decade career.

This fear, however, was not the arachnophobia that one might suppose, given the formidable ‘Maman’. Rather, Bourgeois’ work was driven in part by fear of abandonment; something rooted in her complex and sometimes traumatic childhood. Through her famed oversized sculptures, installations, drawings, paintings and other mediums, she confronted painful personal memories while simultaneously channelling them into work that expresses universal emotions and psychological states.

Across three exhibition ‘chapters’ that each explore a different aspect of family relationships, highlights include the ‘Femme Maison’ series of paintings from the 1940s. These works, which decades later were championed by the feminist movement, each depict a female figure whose top half is obscured by a house which protects yet imprisons her.

Bourgeois’ extensive use of the spider motif, meanwhile, is examined in depth. As hinted at by the landmark ‘Maman’ (the French equivalent of ‘mummy’), for Bourgeois the spider was symbolic of the mother figure who heals wounds just as a spider repairs the threads of its web. The artist's use of this powerful symbol is traced from a small 1947 drawing through to the giant Roppongi arachnid and its 'sister' sculptures located in several cities worldwide.

The exhibition is open until 11pm on September 27 and 28, until 5pm on October 23, and until 10pm on December 24 and 31.

This major exhibition is both a comprehensive overview of Japan’s visual creativity over the past several decades, and an illuminating ‘portrait’ of the state of the nation over the same timeline. It’s also a powerful argument for the importance of a critical and socially engaged mindset, from the perspective of the figure whose vast collection is used to assemble this show. Ryutaro Takahashi, a veteran of the student-led protests that shook 1960s Japan, has since the mid-1990s amassed what is now one of the world’s most significant collections of Japanese contemporary art.

Across two floors of this expansive museum, works by some 115 key artists and art collectives trace the arc of the economically precarious ‘lost decades’ that, from the ’90s onwards and up to the present, have followed Japan’s booming postwar era. In work from key Japanese artists active over this period, the emotional and psychological impact of challenging times is explored overtly by some creators and more obliquely by others. Works from lesser-known, up-and-coming artists are highlighted alongside creations from the biggest names in Japanese contemporary art, including Yayoi Kusama, Takashi Murakami, Shinro Ohtake and Yoshitomo Nara, to name but a few.

Among the exhibition’s six sections, perhaps the most stirring is one titled ‘Breakdown and Rebirth’, which introduces art created in the aftermath of 2011’s Great East Japan Earthquake. Elsewhere, highlights include Makoto Aida’s breathtaking ‘A Picture of an Air-Raid on New York City (War Picture Returns)’ from 1996, in which the artist depicts an imaginary scenario of a Japanese air attack on NYC, upon a six-panel traditional sliding screen.

This exhibition is closed on Mondays (except August 12, September 16 and 23, October 14 and November 4) as well as on August 13, September 17 and 24, October 15 and November 5.

Born in Tokyo in 1936, Keiichi Tanaami is a pioneer of pop art in Japan. Though his ultra-vivid, cartoon-esque creations in assorted media have long been widely acclaimed, and exhibited at such major institutions as the Art Institute of Chicago and London’s Tate Modern, right now Tanaami’s profile is higher than ever. The still-active veteran is currently represented by hip Tokyo gallery Nanzuka, he collaborates with the likes of Adidas and Yohji Yamamoto, and his work is undergoing a major positive reappraisal by the art world’s tastemakers.

Tanaami’s late-career surge in popularity is crowned by his first major career retrospective, taking place at one of his home city’s most prestigious art museums. Across the venue’s expansive galleries, consistently retina-popping work traces the artist’s progression from commercial designer – he was the first art director of Playboy magazine’s Japanese edition – to a leading figure in the country’s underground art scene.

Across paintings, collages, installations, sculptures, film, animation and more, Tanaami’s work shares a degree of spirit with Western pop artists. Simultaneously evident, though, is a visceral understanding of Japan’s unique wartime and postwar history, derived from the artist’s lived experience. The 1967 screen print ‘No More War 1’ echoes the pacifist sentiment of many young Japanese in that era, while ‘Drama of Death and Rebirth’, a 2019 canvas, is a psychedelic hellscape punctuated by fire from US fighter planes. Bringing things right up to date is Tanaami’s 2024 work for Japanese rock band Radwimps.

The work of Yoshiaki Kaihatsu goes one step beyond the social consciousness widely seen in global contemporary art. Born 1966 in Yamanashi prefecture, Kaihatsu has since the 1990s been pursuing work that involves him personally intervening in social structures. This method of his has been described as ‘one-person democracy’, hence the title of his first major show at a Tokyo art museum.

As demonstrated here by around 50 exhibits, Kaihatsu’s work both questions and reimagines the long-entrenched systems that most of us unquestioningly think of as ‘natural’ or ‘normal’. An exhibition zone named ‘Kaihatsu Town’, for example, contains an assortment of unique facilities, including a post office that delivers letters one full year after their posting, and a bank that does not handle money. 

Kaihatsu himself is present in the exhibition room each day (with occasional absences) to conduct activities which visitors may get involved in, or simply observe with intrigue and wonder. These include ‘100 Teachers’, in which 100 unique educators will give 100 equally singular classes, and events involving Kaihatsu’s collaborators in projects centred on the region hit by 2011’s Great East Japan Earthquake.

This exhibition is closed on Mondays (except August 12, September 16 and 23, October 14, November 4) as well as on August 13, September 17 and 24, October 15 and November 5.

Shibuya has a major new contemporary art venue with the opening of this museum, designed to share selections from the formidable private collection of entrepreneur Kankuro Ueshima. The six-storey facility, located within a dramatically renovated building that previously housed the prestigious British School, is set up to display Ueshima’s collection of over 650 works, from foremost Japanese and international artists, to their fullest potential.

This inaugural exhibition approaches contemporary art from a variety of perspectives, with most unfolding over an entire floor of the museum. Down in the basement, the trailblazing spirit of abstract painting is explored through work that ranges in timeline from a 1991 work by Germany’s Gerhard Richter to a piece from London-based Jadé Fadojutimi, known for her investigations of identity and self-knowledge, that was completed just this year.

Spanning the first and second floors, meanwhile, is a look at individual expression that encompasses a breathtaking range of global talent: artists include Olafur Eliasson, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Dan Flavin and Theaster Gates, with several names being represented by multiple artworks. The power of collaborative efforts comes to the fore through pieces created by Takashi Murakami with late Off-White designer Virgil Abloh, and by Louise Bourgeois together with Tracy Emin.

The gaze of Japanese female painters is the theme explored on the third floor, through works by artists including Ulala Imai and Makiko Kudo, while on the fourth floor, works by Tatsuo Miyajima and others take diverse approaches to the notion of things changing and things disappearing. Finally, floor five is dedicated to a selection of paintings by Yoko Matsumoto, an abstract artist who derives inspiration from Western artistic modes while expressing an Asian sensibility.

Note that tickets are not available at the door; they must be purchased in advance online.

The life of painter Tanaka Isson (1908-1977), best known for expressing the natural beauty of the Unesco World Heritage-designated island Amami Oshima, took a truly dramatic arc. While still a child, his outstanding talent for nanga – a Japanese painting style inspired by the aesthetics of the Chinese literati – led to him being hailed as a young prodigy destined for success.

After he dropped out of Tokyo Fine Arts School (now Tokyo University of the Arts) for still-unknown reasons, subsequent decades saw Isson work as a farmer, while continuing to paint despite lack of recognition. At the age of 50, in 1958, he relocated alone to remote Amami Oshima, close to Okinawa in Japan’s southwest, whose tropical flora and fauna would inspire him anew.

While working as a fabric dyer to support his artistic practice, Isson developed a way of conveying his idyllic new surroundings that was painterly and simultaneously marked by a level of vivid detail that could today be described as ‘high definition’. It was only following Isson’s death at the age of 69, while still residing on Amami Oshima, that his work began to receive its long-overdue acclaim.

Isson’s posthumous reputation has continued to grow, culminating in this major retrospective comprising over 250 works. Paintings, sketches, documents and other artefacts create a complete picture of the artist’s life and work, with some recently discovered pieces revealing hitherto unknown aspects of his creative practice.

This exhibition is closed on Mondays (except September 23, October 14, November 4),
September 24, October 15 and November 5.