Archive for 'Harajuku' Category

Miyu Koike’s fan event of the first visit to Meiji Shrine

A young female idol Miyu Koike, who has become popular especially due to a TV show called “God Tongue”(http://www.tv-tokyo.co.jp/god/), hosted a special fan- meeting event  of  the first visiting of the year to Meiji Shrine in Harajuku Tokyo on the Jan. 3rd.(http://koikemiyu.cm-ent.jp/)

She sings “Nakimushi Princess”(/Crybaby princess) that is the theme song of “Anime mashite”, a TV show of featuring anime information.(http://www.tv-tokyo.co.jp/anime/animemashite/index2.html) So, noe she is a popular singer and idol of subculture. This time she prayed at one of the most popular shinto shrine with a lot of  fans of hers for good luck fo the new year.

Nogizaka 46’s first concert tour

Nogizaka46, a popular young female idol group and “the official rival of AKB48” hosted its very first solo concert tour of  nine concerts 16-30 at five venues. The final one was held at Meiji Jingu Stadium in Tokyo(http://www.jingu-stadium.com/), which more than 30,000 people visited.

(http://www.nogizaka46.com/)

A music concert was held at the stadium for the first time in 14 years.

 

Festival at MEIJI- JINGU shrine

It was sunny warm day today. BUGAKU was performed on stage at MEIJI-GINGU shrine. BUGAKU belong to the genre of GAGAKU, which is a form of ancient court music. The musical composition was modeled on ancient music and dance.
GAGAKU flourished in the HEIAN period and is still being performed at the Imperial Court, shrine, and temple in Japan. GAGAKU with dance is called BUGAKU.
Spring Grand Festival hold from April 29th to May 3rd. I hope you have a time to visit.

National Foundation Day, Feb.11th

Japan’s National Foundation day falls on Feb,11th. This year a lot of related events were held.    lectures about the Japanese mythology were held at some shrines or academic facilities, and supecial commemorative parades were conducted in the Meiji Shrine, Harajuku,Aoyama, Omotesando area where a lot of people including foreign tourists visit even on ordinary occasions. Still the shrine where the Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken are enshrined may have special meanings of  love of  the country. (http://kenkoku.web.fc2.com/parade.htm)

Tokyo is elected as the host of the Olympic & Paralympic Games in 2020

Tokyo was elected as the host of the Olympic Games by IOC at its general meeting held in Buenos Aaires on Sep.7th. (http://www.olympic.org/ioc)

Tokyo was elected  defeating other two candidates of  Madrid and Istanbul.At the first vote, Tokyo got 42 votes while the other two both got 26 each, which caused the second and third place decision vote. At that decision vote, Istanbul defeated Madrid  by  49 to 45 and  in such, the final vote was done to choose Tokyo or Istanbul. And Tokyo won by 60 to 36 in the final.  A lot of  people watching the live broadcast of the course of the meeting on TV gave exultant cries in many places all over Japan or even overseas, when the IOC president Jacques Rogge declared Tokyo was elected saying, “Tokyo !” producing the document with the name of the successful bidder “TOKYO 2020”.

Tokyo will have hosted Olympic and Paralympic games for the first time in 56 years in coming 2020. Personally, I have a “bond” with the last Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games  back in 1964 which was the first Games in Japan.  I was born on the closing day of the events and now I live near Komazawa Olympic Park which was one of the venues of  the events 49 years ago. In addition, at the presentation time for the candidates, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Tokyo Governer Naoki Inose, Christel Takigawa, a popular newscaster, and  HRH Princess Takamado, all of  whom made passionate and persuasive addresses in either English or French respectively. HRH Princess Takamado’s late husband HRH Prince Takamado made dedications in nature conservation activities where he helped my father.

This election is a proof that the international community now has recognized Japan’s good recovery from the aftermaths of  the earthquake and tsunami disaster in the northeast part of the country in 2011. Before the vote was done, PM Abe  assured the safety  answering a question about the worries of crippled nuclear plant in Fukushima and leakage of contaminated  water near there. He said,”Let me assure you the situation is under control,”  “It has never done or will do any damage to Tokyo.”, “You should read past the headlines and look at the facts,”  “The contaminated water has been contained in an area of the harbour only 0.3 square kilometres big,”  “There have been no health problems and nor will there be. I will be taking responsibility for all the programmes with regard to the plant and the leaks.”

Rogge said, “Tokyo is the most reliable bidder in committe members opinions that is expected to deliver safe and elaborately planned Games in order to pass on the sigificance of  sports to next generations.”

With those strong supports, expectations, and recognitions of  the  safety and reliability of  Tokyo or Japan by the international community,  it is highly expected that foreign visitors to Japan and Tokyo will  surely increase  even more from now on.

 

FNS Summer Song festival

FNS  Summer Song Festival is being  held at National Stadium First Gymnasium  18:55-23:08 on Jul.31, whose course is being live braodcastedon TV.http://www.fujitv.co.jp/FNS/2013s/

More than  70 musicians or groups are performing on the stage all of whom are popular.

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu x Zipper Magazine’s 20th Anniversary Event

Zipper magazine which offers distinctive looks for teenage will held a special event “Zipper 20th LAFORET PARTY” will be held at Laforet HARAJUKU on Mar 30.

A Fashion show, live show and talk event will be held featuring model and singer Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, duo singers PUFFY, actress Riisa Naka, performer IMALU, photographer Mika Ninagawa, Akiba idols, dempagumi.inc and others.

Prior to the event, Zipper memorial items are in store.Limited items from 40 stores including gathered dress with cat and cross print (priced at 5,995 yen) by E hyphen world gallery, smile print denim (priced at 17,640 yen) by RNA MEDIA, color block T-shirt (priced at 3,990 yen) by POU DOU DOU will be on sale from Mar 23.

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu Ninjari Bang Bang

6%DOKIDOKI opens pop-up store at Isetan

6%DOKIDOKI is temporarily open within “TOKYO Kaihouku” on the 2nd floor of the main building of Isetan Shinjuku.

On the 30th, Masuda attended the event with his shop staff. Fans of the brand lined up to take photos with Masuda and his staff as well as receive autographs.

The producer of the brand Sebastian Masuda met Kyary Pamyu Pamyu as she was a customer of the brand and he now handles the art direction of the star’s concerts and music videos. The participants of the event included elementary school students who came to know the brand through the influence of Kyary and adults who have been fans since their teens.

TGC 16 at National Yoyogi Stadium

TGC16, “Tokyo Girls Collection 16”, the 16th turn of  one of the most popular female fashion events in Japan  was held on Today March  2nd  15:00-21:00 at National Yoyogi Stadium First Gymnasium in Tokyo.(http://girlswalker.com/tgc/13ss/)

Namie Amuro, a popular female singer showed up as a “secret guest performer” and sang in the opening event. She took part in this huge fashion event for the first time.

And, one of the prominent parts of the show was that Kintaro, a celebrity impersonator who has suddenly become surprisingly popular due to her impersonating performances of Atsuko Maeda, an ex-AKB48 top member, showed such a performance of “Atsuko Maeda’s part”, which earned a boisterous applause from the audience.

82 top female models, such as Karina, Kiko Mizuhara, Anna Tsuchiya,Yu Yamada, and others showed up and emthralled  the audience of about 30,000 with their beauty, fancy fashion,and performances.

 

 

 

“Girls Award 2013 SPRING/SUMMER” on March.23, performers

“Girls Award 2013 SPRING/SUMMER”  is planned to be hosted on this March 23th at  the First Gymnasium of National Stadium in Yoyogi Tokyo, which I referred to in my previous post here. (http://girls-award.com/pc/index.php)  On Jan.30th, some of the names of  singers, musicians, and models who are to perform in the event were disclosed.

As singers, FTISLAND and  Tomomi Kahara who recently made her re-debut and others are going to perform at the show.

This Girls Award is the seventh of the same annual events of girls’ fashions and  on the same day or near dates, some other similar girls’ fashion events will be held as well, such as “Tokyo Girls Collection”, “Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week TOKYO 2013-14A/W”,and “VERSUS TOKYO”.

MomokuroZ’s new year’s resolution

“MomokuroZ”(Momoiro CloverZ), one of the top young female idol groups, declared their

new goal on the new year’s day.  

The  group’s first goal was to join and perform at Kohaku Utagassen, the Red and White singing contest on the new year’s eve , which MomokuroZ realized on Dec.31 2012. And now, the group has a new purpose that it will host live concerts at National Stadium (http://naash.go.jp/corp/english/activities/tabid/391/Default.aspx) in Yoyogi that is so closely located to NHK, the TV station where Kohaku is held.  That is how Momokuro has set out the “second chapter” of its activities of “dreams beyond Kohaku”. However, the stadium is currently under a renovation which is scheduled to complete in 2018, so the day to fulfill the group’s next dream has not been clearly set or predicted yet.

 

 

IMF/WBG Annual Meetings in Tokyo

IMF(International Monetary Fund) and WBG(World bank Group) Annual meetings were held in Tokyo  for the first time in 48 years Oct.9-14.(http://www.imf-wb.2012tokyo.mof.go.jp/en/index.html)

Japan hosted such meetings 48 years ago which was the very same year that Japan  hosted Tokyo Olympics, which was a remarkable symbolic event of Japan’s successful recovery form the economic recession due to the post war aftermaths of WW2. Now, the Japan’s economic, political, and social positions and international community’s situations have drastically changed as well. This time the second  time’s phases have shown the historic exaltation of the country.

There were four venues of the event, namely, TIF(Tokyo International Forum),IM(Imperial Hotel),Hotel Okura, and  TCCI (Tokyo Chamber of Commerce and Industry), all of which are located in the very center of this capital of Japan .    Totally official participants were from 187 countries and registered visitors and participants , their dependents amounted to about 20,000.   Top economic leaders of the world got together and Tokyo soaked in the heat and excitement of  the great festivity.  On the 12th, the plenary and official banquet hosted by Noda, the prime minister of Japan were held.

There were about 20 official hotels designated as official accommodation for the participants and dependents and  special hospitality programs were prepared which provided them with  various short trips such as on-day visit to Yokohama,  visiting Tsukiji  Fish Market,  Tokyo Sky Tree just built in this year, shopping at depachika (basement floors in  department stores ),cultural experience tour such as a tea ceremony,  learning how to wear kimono, and so forth. A lot of  participants and other registered visitors enjoyed those short tours or traditional Japanese cultural experiencing events.

The local host of the Annual Meetings were MOF (Minister of Finance) and Bank of Japan, Tokyo Metropolitan Government ,and so many people including volunteer staffers,  pro tour guides, escorts and others attended the visitors from all over the world.  The hosts, the government, and  others say more than 10 billion yen  revenue can be expected from this greatly worldwide financial series of events.  We hope this has influenced  betterment of Japanese economy, tourism, and society as a whole.

Tommy Hilfiger Omotesando

Actress Jessica Alba and singer GACKT attended an opening event for “Tommy Hilfiger Omotesando” at ‘Tokyu Plaza Omotesando Harajuku‘ on April 16th.

Did GACKT feel nervous next to Jessica Alba?
Read the rest of this entry »

EVANGELION STORE opening in Harajuku

“NEON GENESIS EVANGELION”, one of the most popular anime work series both in Japan and the world, is going to open its first “real ” or “physical” store of related items, “EVANGELION STORE” in Harajuku Tokyo on this Nov.23rd. http://www.evastore.jp/real/index.html

So far, that store chain has widely and successfully developed popular items and goods related to the anime work and prosperous as an online store chain. http://www.evastore.jp/pc/

The name of the new real store is “EVANGELION STORE TOKYO-01 ” , jointly operated by GroundWorks (http://gworks.biz/) and MOVIC (http://www.movic.jp/index.html), both of which operate the online store chain as well.

The location of the new store (1-8-23, Jingumae, Shibuya-ku,Tokyo) is in the quite popular and well-known area of  cosplay and subcultural fashions as well as a traditional Japanese culture where Meiji Shrine, one of the most popular Shinto shrines is located.  The area is popular the young and old or even foreign tourists with interesting harmonized atmosphere of  old and new aspects of Japanese culture.

This first real Evangelion Store is to be two-storied, whose first floor is featured with apparel an fashion sorts, and second floor is of  various kinds of Eva’s items expected to meet  requirements of  both ordinary fans and great lovers of the anime work series. The first floor also includes an event hall where various events of Eva series are to be hosted, such as some special events to promote the new anime movie “Evangelion new theatrical version:Q” which is planned to released in autumn 2012.

The management say they intend to enhance  more firsthand communications with fans and expect the fans to view and touch the items to feel the attractions more intensively. The store plans to host special presale events of related items  occasionally.

 

Kiyomasa’s Well at Meiji Shrine popular as power spot

A well in a garden of Tokyo’s Meiji Shrine has drawn masses of visitors who believe it is a power spot where they can experience positive energy.

Meiji Shirine is the largest Shinto shrine in Tokyo, dedicated to Emperor Meiji and his consort, Emperess Shoken, who passed away in 1912 & 1914 respectively. It was constructed just after the first world war.

The Kiyomasa’s well ( Kiyomasa no Ido) is said to have been dug by famous feudal warlord Kato Kiyomasa, whose family, according to the shrine, had a mansion in the area during the Edo period, although it is unknown if Kiyomasa lived there.

The site became famous after some television programs featured it with people claiming that their luck improved when they used pictures of the well as background screens on their cellphones.

Visitors must pay 500 yen to enter the garden and will need to obtain a numbered ticket to view the well.