21_21 Design Sight, Tokyo...'Redirect your eyes'...

My last day in Tokyo and I realised I'd almost forgotten about this place! I would have hated myself if I'd missed it because not only is 21_21 Design Sight an incredibly beautiful building, but the exhibition that's currently running, KOME The Art of Rice, is truly one of the best I've ever seen anywhere in the world. It's a very personal thing is art and for me this display of rice in its various forms was utterly captivating in its simplicity and presentation. 'In this exhibition, we take a fresh look at rice not only as food but also as Japanese culture, with graphic designer Taku Satoh and cultural anthropologist Shinichi Takemura acting as exhibition directors'.

The architect of 21_21 Design Sight, is unsurprisingly Tadao Ando and the Directors of the actual facility are three of the best, Issey Miyake (clothing designer), Taku Satoh (graphic designer) and Naoto Fukusawa (product designer). As per the website, 21_21 is a launch pad that provides the vision (sight) to search for, discover, and make things indispensable to the times and design as culture that enlivens our daily lives.

I spent hours there, mesmerized by the tiny writing on even tinier grains of rice, the superb photographs of everything rice-connected, moving short films featuring interviews with rice farmers and makers of sake, the test tubes of simulated growing rice, the endless framed sake labels, graphics, grasses, paddy field hats and long boots, the tools of the trade...there was so much amazingness which as you know, is something I'm constantly in search of as I wander here, there and everywhere, like Alice.

I've seen rice in a new light, with fresh, redirected eyes. So kudos to 21_21 Design Sight and KOME - you captivated and enriched me today and left me feeling lighter and gentler.

Walking down from Tokyo Midtown...

Striking angles...21_21 Design Sight is a work of art in itself...

Inside...

Gorgeous photographs by Yusuke Nishibe...

Wonderment...

Rice the way it looks before it's hulled...

Straw creations...

Constantly moving images of growing rice....

Everyone gets a chance to try write their name on a grain of rice. I gave up and just drew a heart...see next pic...

For details re how to get there (Roppongi) see www.2121designsight.jp

All pics on a Canon D600 | copyright DIVA PR

Lying under the Sakura in Shinjuku Gyoen Park, Tokyo...

What a day, what a park. Seemed as if everyone was out in the spring sunshine today. I took advantage of the good weather, got myself a pain au chocolate, tea and a tub of yoghurt and did breakfast under a cherry blossom tree...the Sakura are looking magnificent at Gyoen. This 58 hectare garden started it's life as an imperial one in 1879 and in 1949 became open to the public for the first time, being named the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden in 2001. There are 3 styles of garden here: Japanese, French and English. The garden is a favourite hanami (cherry-blossom viewing) spot and I tell you, it draws a vast local and tourist crowd with its more than 20,000 trees. In bloom it's a sight to behold: 1,500 cherry trees bloom from late March (Shidare or Weeping Cherry), to early April (Somei or Tokyo Cherry), and on to late April (Kanzan Cherry). Other trees found here include the majestic Himalayan cedars, which soar above the rest of the trees in the park, tulip trees, cypresses, and plane trees, which were first planted in Japan in the Imperial Gardens.

Scenes from Shinjuku Gyoen...

Peeping through the Sakura...

 

Just married....

 

 

Picnic under a cherry blossom tree...

 

The pavilion viewing point...

 

Take the metro to Shinjuku Gyoenmae...the park is literally a street away...ask anyone...

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A beautiful children's library by Tadao Ando, in Tokyo...

Tadao Ando is a legendary Japanese architect, someone Lateral Paul has spoken to me about for years, literally. So to see the International Children's Library (and thanks to Shingo for taking me there) was a major design and creative moment for me. Located within Ueno Park in Tokyo, the International Library of Children's Literature is a renovation and expansion of the former Imperial Library built in 1906 and expanded in 1929. (This next part is courtesy www.galinsky.com, for those who know design/architecture): The subtle interventions of Ando create a dynamic juxtaposition between the old and the new while creating the first national library dedicated to children's literature.

Whatever your knowledge of design etc, one thing stands out- the dedication of the local government to inspire children about books and reading, especially crucial in a techno age where finger-tapping on smartphones is the order of the day and turning a page is fast becoming obsolete ...

The facade....

Inside....the play of light is beautiful and note the chair designs....

Glass wrapped around an ancient staircase....feeling Paris here, there & everywhere...

A wonderful experience for kids....to be surrounded by such creativity is so amazing- they're absorbing top end design without even realizing it...

Looking into the research room...note the circular lines inside...

Kids have everything at their disposal here...and again, stylish chairs...

Hello Kitty & origami on the Librarian's desk...just perfect...

The International Library of Children's Literature

12-49 Ueno Park

Taito-ku, Tokyo

110-0007 Japan

Easy to find on the Metro as well....enjoy!

 

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Part with your plastic here...Omotesando in Tokyo...

If you're going to do a spot of serious shopping, parting with your precious plastic to score top end brands you feel you cannot live without, then do it properly and lose yourself somewhere where your surroundings are so beautiful that you won't feel the pain. These places exist in Tokyo, where odes to retail will blow your mind and eliminate any buyers' remorse lurking beneath the surface (otherwise known as your conscience), I can almost guarantee it. You may not even intend to buy, but buy you shall, because your purchasing environment will be so very pretty and too tempting to refuse. Ask me, I know this feeling- I just bought a watch at Paul Smith, Omotesando. Why, I'm not too sure - my 50th birthday present to myself perhaps? Who knows - the store was 2 levels of loveliness and I just could not resist.
Retail architecture ensues, taken to a whole new level in Omotesando, Tokyo - it has it's very own Champs Elysees ...this is uber shopping if ever I saw it, in the East of the world. Do it, if only to buy a pair of socks. I did that too, just by the way.

Introducing the Ted Baker building...

Tommy Hilfiger...

The interior of Omotesando Hills Shopping Malls, designed by the legendary Japanese architect Tadao Ando...

Partial exterior shot of Omotesando Hills mall...

Tokyo's own Champs Élysées - Otomesando ...

The Dior building, designed by architects Sejima Kazuyo & Nishizawa Ryue...

Chanel is in the building at right with the MoMA store on the 2nd floor...always full of amazing treasures...

Our friend Shingo...he of endless patience ....

Take the Metro to Omotesando - easy to find....enjoy....

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A Tokyo church, like none other...

Our good friend Shingo took me to see breathtaking buildings today, designed by some of Japan's foremost architects. St Mary's Cathedral in Sekiguchi, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo (Metro stop is Edogawabashi), was our first stop, and it's all I expected-  spectacular. Before it was flattened in a WWll air raid in 1945, St Mary's church was a simple wooden gothic structure. Kenzo Tange was tasked with creating the new house of worship, an imposing house of worship that must have seemed way ahead of its time when it opened in 1964, some 50 years ago. I managed to sneak one pic inside, of the stained glass window at the altar - all the other details of the interior can be found online. My photos don't really do the building justice- it can be captured from many more different angles and from the sky it presents another beautiful perspective. Good luck getting that angle ...

The stained glass window behind the altar - so beautiful..

More info re Kenzo Tange- he is said to have been the greatest exponent of modern architecture in Japan and the first Japanese to be awarded the Pritzker prize. Tange's cathedral project is described as being at the midpoint between Modernism and Metabolism, between the abstract and the symbolic, between the bright and polished exterior and the dark and rough interior... in sum, between the East and the West *

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Hiroshima & the extraordinary Peace Park...

I had such limited time but simply knew I had to do Hiroshima - firstly I realised it was something I could not omit from my trip to JP, without a doubt it would be an exceptional memorable experience; secondly, via Kyoto the journey via bullet train is 1 hour 45 as opposed to 4 hours from Tokyo- a big incentive obviously. And thirdly - last year I was fortunate enough to do the PR for a beautiful play called Sadako, created by Jaqueline Dommisse and the late Peter Hayes from the Hearts & Eyes Collective...a truly beautiful piece of theatre using Japanese style bunraku puppets (created by Janni Younge) and telling the moving tale about little Sadako Sasaki and the 1000 paper cranes. It really impacted me and believe it or not, that was the beginning of my dreamings of Japan. I can hardly believe I was there - standing in awe at the various monuments to Sadako who died from leukemia (radiation fallout), and seeing the various memorials to global peace - an unforgettable experience. The memorial remembers areas, not only people and children - everything that was blown into obilvion when the bomb dropped on 6 August 1945 - the park covers 122000m2 in a neighbourhood of the Nakajima district. A blessing for me was that the cherry blossoms (Sakura) were out, properly, covering the tree branches like thick balls of cotton wool...my best.... I never expected to see them and I'll never forget this day, on so many levels.

The A Bomb Memorial...a UNESCO World Heritage Site as of 1996. May we never (again) experience a nuclear explosion...

Walking across the river towards the park...the Sakura in full bloom..

The Children's Peace Monument...that's. Sadako holding a crane aloft...

I rang the bell attached to the golden crane inside the monument...

The Cenotaph monument to the A Bomb victims, some 220000 people lost their lives that day, and thousands more afterwards...

Memorial Tower, dedicated to mobilized students (see www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp for more)...

Looking down from the bridge, the A Bomb memorial at left...

New life and hope in the foreground, and in the background the remains of a terrifying time...

I was so blessed to see the Sakura out in full bloom as well...totally unexpected and what an incredible feeling to walk beneath them....they are unique and quite magical to me...

Paper origami cranes, as per what you can see in the tower image, hanging behind the statue (mobilized students pic)...

Directions: Once you get to Hiroshima station (on the JR Line), take the South exit and head for the number 2 or 6 tram (costs 150Y) and get off at the A Bomb done stop, about a 1.5km ride. Any probs, head for the ? Which is information- they are so helpful, as always, all over Japan.

 

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