The gentrification and renaissance of Yoshiwara, the former licensed red-light district (and today, an unlicensed red-light district), continues.
After a designer souvenir shop we saw earlier in the year now comes a new book shop, Kasutori Shobo. The store opened on September 3rd in the heart of Yoshiwara, selling books reprinting valuable resources and history about Yoshiwara and the adult side to the Showa era.
Alongside other publishers' titles, the shop also publishes its own books. The owner, Goh Watanabe, raised money via a crowdfunding service to do this, achieving his target in ...
Yoshiwara was the main red-light district (yukaku) in Edo, the old name for Tokyo. Its legacy continues to resonate today: the area remains full of soaplands and prostitutes, and other parts of the east of the city, such as Ueno, Nippori and Akihabara, are also centers of cheap sex.
That being said, Yoshiwara is gentrifying to a certain extent -- and here's an interesting example, first reported on Spoon Tamago.
But for designer Yayoi Okano, Yoshiwara was more than just a neighborhood known for its sex trade. It was home.
Okano grew up in Yoshiwara where, despite its ...
Forget Toyota and Sony, the real beneficiaries of Abenomics and the boost to the economy Japan is receiving (at least in spirit) is Yoshiwara, the old red light district near the Tokyo Sky Tree and still active centuries after it first became a licensed sex area.
Of course, these days prostitution is officially outlawed (thanks to the US occupation for that) but the true Yoshiwara experience can still be enjoyed in the soaplands, where you get a bubbly rub-down followed by other kinds of services.
The increase in tourists to the nearby Sky Tree is having a knock-on effect on the ...
The Japanese have always been kinky.
You may know that there are ancient Japanese dildos, historical erotic prints, fart war scrolls, and even bamboo sex dolls from long ago.
But did you know there was also a sex shop in old Tokyo? Yotsumeya was in the Ryogoku area of Edo (the old name for Tokyo), a bustling center and not too far from the famous red light district, Yoshiwara. It first opened in 1626, making it the oldest adult goods shop in Japan, though sadly it closed in the Meiji period (late nineteenth century) when Japan was trying to "modernize" (and did such foolish things ...
