Top choice in Harajuku & Aoyama
Nezu Museum offers a striking blend of old and new: a renowned collection of Japanese, Chinese and Korean antiquities in a gallery space designed by contemporary architect Kuma Kengo. Select items from the extensive collection are displayed in seasonal exhibitions. The English explanations are usually pretty good. Behind the galleries is a woodsy strolling garden laced with stone paths and studded with teahouses and sculptures.
There’s a glass-walled cafe (also designed by Kuma), too.
5.12 MILES
If you visit only one museum in Tokyo, make it the Tokyo National Museum. Here you'll find the world's largest collection of Japanese art, including…
8.58 MILES
This museum is the heart of the Studio Ghibli world, a beloved (even 'adored') film studio responsible for classic, critically-acclaimed animated titles…
2.3 MILES
Golden Gai – a Shinjuku institution for over half a century – is a collection of tiny bars, often literally no bigger than a closet and seating maybe a…
0.96 MILES
Rumoured to be the busiest intersection in the world (and definitely in Japan), Shibuya Crossing is like a giant beating heart, sending people in all…
14.92 MILES
This impressively slick attraction is dedicated to, you guessed it, cup noodles. But in reality, its focus is more broad, with numerous exhibitions…
1.4 MILES
Digital-art collective teamLab has created 60 artworks for this museum, open in 2018, that tests the border between art and the viewer: many are…
2.46 MILES
The Imperial Palace occupies the site of the original Edo-jō, the Tokugawa shogunate's castle. In its heyday this was the largest fortress in the world,…
5.75 MILES
Tokyo’s most visited temple enshrines a golden image of Kannon (the Buddhist goddess of mercy), which, according to legend, was miraculously pulled out of…
1. Taro Okamoto Memorial Museum
0.12 MILES
A painter and sculptor, Okamoto Tarō was Japan's most recognised artist from the post-WWII period, a rare avant-garde figure with mass appeal. His works…
0.19 MILES
Of course you could shop here, but pretty much everyone comes just to ogle the curvaceous glass bubbles of the boutique's exterior, designed by Herzog &…
0.24 MILES
Kengo Kuma's design for Taiwanese pineapple cake shop SunnyHills uses 3D-modelled latticework that's supposed to evoke a bamboo basket but also resembles…
0.33 MILES
The asymmetrical, geometric shape of architect Maki Fumihiko's Spiral Building (1985) may not look very sinuous on the outside, but the name will make…
0.42 MILES
This broad, tree-lined boulevard is lined with boutiques from the top European fashion houses. More interesting are the buildings themselves, designed by…
0.48 MILES
The cherry-tree-lined paths of Japan’s first public cemetery are used by locals as shortcuts through the neighbourhood and as a place for picnics during…
0.48 MILES
Pritzker Prize–winner Itō Toyō designed the Tod's boutique (2004). The criss-crossing strips of concrete take their inspiration from the zelkova trees…
0.53 MILES
Aoki Jun’s design for Louis Vuitton (2002) features offset panels of tinted glass behind sheets of metal mesh of varying patterns and is, fittingly, meant…