Tokyo Blog

I finally managed to get inside the new H&M store in Tokyo’s famous, upmarket shopping district of Ginza. It was a weekday evening, so I was confident I would be able to get in. However, come on a Saturday and you will still queue 150 metres down the street. No exaggeration.

Despite the fact that there was no queue, the shop was packed. The first thing to strike me was the floor plan near the elevator. Three floors of women’s clothes, with only the basement dedicated to men. I was on the ground floor (which is known as the 1st floor in Japan), and had already seen the women’s clothes on display when I came in, and I was already thinking that it was, as I feared, going to be very different from H&M in the UK. I already expected this to be the case based on my shopping experiences in H&M stores in Barcelona and Lille, both of which were quite different from each other. I went down to the basement level and looked through the racks for a bit, but nothing really jumped out at me. H&M in the UK is definitely more adventurous than it’s Japanese counterpart. In Japan, H&M is more like Gap. No bright colours, no design prints, and a muted palette. Most of the stuff is either black or grey, and verges on smart-casual. Last time I was in the UK H&M stores, it was more like a cyberpunk 80’s revival. The two couldn’t have been more different. Zannen.

I did an interview for the web designer review site Spicy Web Designers. I haven’t got much else to say, I just wanted to share the link. Thanks for reading!

When I left the UK economy looked like it might be on the verge of recession. In fact, there was talk of a global recession in the not too distant future. I didn’t realise how much this was going to affect me though. The pound against the yen is my biggest woe. When I arrived in Tokyo, it was up at 215 yen to the pound. Now it’s plummeted to 174 yen to the pound! This is crazy! It’s bad for me, because I sometimes get paid in pounds and then move it all to my Japanese bank accounts. Looks like I might need to put my prices up. Down with Labour.

UPDATE: I know it’s not necessarily the fault of the Labour government and that there is a bigger picture, but I just like to dig them at any opportunity because I don’t like them.

It’s been out since July 22nd on DVD, but I still haven’t seen it, and yes, it’s yet another film about Tokyo! I have no idea how good the film is, but it seems to have received a few positive reviews and the clips I’ve seen look promising. Now I’m living in Tokyo, I have less of an urge to watch films about the city. Before, I used to scour the TV guide in the UK for anything relating to Tokyo, Japanese design, etc., and I’d always enjoy watching movies featuring Tokyo. Lost in Translation is the obvious example, but I love watching Kitano or Miike flicks too, because they were often set in Tokyo.

UPDATE: As andersdu points out below, this film is not set in Tokyo at all, but set in Japantown in San Jose! Still wanna watch it though.

Here you can see the jewel-encrusted items on sale at Shibuya 109, a large department store consisting of several floors of fashion and accessories aimed at ‘Shibuya boys’ and ‘Shibuya girls’. I can’t remember how much the bike cost, but it was A LOT. Ker-ching.

Tokyo! is a new film recently released about, well, Tokyo.

I don’t know why I didn’t post about it before. I’ve known about it for a while, forgotten about it, and was reminded of it when it launched in cinemas across Japan recently. A friend of mine went to see it, but struggled with the fact that there were no English subs. Our Japanese is OK, but not good enough to understand dialogue in a Japanese film. I’ve yet to see it. I might wait until it comes to DVD so I can get the English subs.

To whet your interest though: the film consists of 3, half-hour segments, each one directed by a different director. The three being Bong Joon-Ho, Michel Gondry and Leos Carax. I won’t go into the individual storylines. Instead, I will direct you to PingMag’s excellent article on the film.

Cinematic Orchestra with DJ Food. I HAVE to go to this event.

I dropped into Wired Cafe on the 6th Floor of Q-FRONT Shibuya today to take advantage of their free wi-fi connection. I’m currently re-working an ongoing Flash project which I expect to be able to unveil soon, schedule allowing.

The cafe is pretty unremarkable. I personally prefer the Shinagawa Wired Cafe just down the road from my apartment, but it served it’s purpose. I also discovered it’s a great place to pick up information on forthcoming music events in Tokyo. I even picked up a nicely illustrated book on surfing in and around the Tokyo area. That’s going to come in very handy when a day off finally comes round and I can finally get in the water again.

The food was average. I chose the French onion soup, an asparagus and mozzarella wrap and a cup of coffee, but it wasn’t worth the ¥1400 price tag. My MacBook Pro battery being what it is, I didn’t really take full advantage of the free wi-fi either, but I got a chunk of work done, then took off back into Shibuya.

I know H&M have been in Tokyo for over a week now, but I didn’t bother to post about it before, because I hadn’t been there to get any pics at that time. However, I was in Ginza on Saturday, and got a shot of the frontage. The crazy thing is, they’re still queuing up the street to get in. Police and security are controlling the crowds. Maybe the Rei Kawakubo gear dropped already?

This site isn’t exactly great, as the avatars you create here don’t look particularly manga at all. Still, it’s a good laugh making one of yourself and your friends. I found I couldn’t easily make myself, but I could do my friends no problem!

This is a pretty funny clip via Japan Probe, that shows a section from the Japanese show TV Champion, where mascots from all over Japan take part in a battle for supremacy. In this round, they go head to head in a soccer match to the death.

Here we have a shot of a sign taken in Tokyo, incouraging commuters to take part in the Japanese tradition of bumping into each other. There are many examples of the bad use of English in warning signs and public information blurbs in Japan, all of which seem hilarious to English speakers! I feel a series coming on!

Picture taken by my good friend Trent McBride. Thanks Trent!

Last week I picked up a copy of Web Designing Magazine from Parco Ikebukuro. Actually, I’ve seen it in the magazine section of other book stores since, so I think it’s got pretty good circulation. Certainly better than Monocle, which is extremely hard to find in Japan, although it is all in English which might have a lot to do with it.

Web Designing is all in Japanese, but you can certainly get the jist of it, and it unearths some great new websites and profiles some great producers. It even deconstructs several websites in this issue, offering an insight into other designers’ creative use of CSS, XHTML and images. It’s a little bit expensive at ¥1280, but if you’re in the industry, you should grab yourself a copy.

Front cover is by Prismgirl.

I’m a fan of Nike basketball boots. Well, just trainers in general. So I’m interested to hear about a relatively new section of the Nike website dedicated to the classic Dunk series. There’s a load of colourways (that look identical to the last lot) coming out soon. These get previewed, plus you can make your own dunks. But you have to register first.

Horrible news about Nagi Noda, I’m afraid. The renowned artist and director, only in her mid-30’s, passed away this past Sunday from complications arising from surgery she had following a serious car accident that she was involved in last year. Her surreal approach to direction attracted clients such as Nike and Coca-Cola, but she also made promos for artists like The Scissor Sisters, Japanese singer Yuki, and Hikaru Utada. I personally liked her Hanpanda creation best of all. She’ll be missed.

News via Boing Boing, Tokyo Mango, and all over the web today and yesterday.