Transport authorities launched a full-fledged investigation Sunday into the derailment of a bullet train on the Akita Shinkansen Line in Daisen, Akita Prefecture, on Saturday afternoon.
It's a dangerous, unpredictable world. Twice in January Chinese warships in the East China Sea challenged Japan's Maritime Self Defense Forces patrols in a manner deemed threatening. And on Feb. 12 came North Korea's nuclear test.
Here's an open secret: Japanese men have a bad international reputation on the romance front.
SELLING WOMEN: Prostitution, Markets and the Household in Early Modern Japan, by Amy Stanley. University of California Press, 2012, 282 pp., $49.95 (hardcover) In the vast cultural landscape, Japan fascinates the mainstream with manga and anime, the martial arts, Zen and kimono. Of course, ...
Kenta Maeda shook off worries about his form with five shutout innings as Japan beat China 5-2 in first-round Pool A of the World Baseball Classic on Sunday at Fukuoka Dome. Japan improved to 2-0 following a tough win over Brazil in Saturday evening’s ...
A drop of light Designer Tokujin Yoshioka applies his unique touch to yet another product category, this time lighting, with the stunning new Tear Drop lamp for the Yamagiwa brand. Yoshioka has proven time and again that he can use a variety of materials ...
Your new best friend If Japan is the land of the robots, as the international media would have us believe, then maybe it’s time to get a little robotic friend of your own for the home. AIBO’s days may have passed, but that’s all ...
Word play As the shelves in my apartment will attest, I like toys, so I’m thrilled to feature one this month: the Dainippon Type Organization’s Toypography play set created for stationery and office supplier Kokuyo. This is not the first collaboration between the design ...
Earlier this month at Tokyo Big Sight exhibition center, the massive Interior Lifestyle show hosted more than 600 exhibitors, more than half of which were domestic companies. Having dug through the many products on display, this week I will spotlight the best Japanese designs ...
Eggish timer This column has been quite friendly to Issey Miyake’s collection of watches in the past, and no wonder, with superstar designers like Naoto Fukasawa and Tokujin Yoshioka contributing designs that have fast become iconic and easily recognizable. It’s time to revisit them ...
Shredding mystery When I first laid eyes on the Conof by n.o.l., I had no idea what it was but immediately developed a unprovoked yearning for it. So when I eventually figured out that it was a paper shredder, there was a moment of ...
Spring is in the air, and that means two things: a city draped in the pink of cherry blossoms — hey, pink is the new black, so get with it; and the start of a new school year. So I’ll concentrate this month’s picks ...
Great design ideas do not necessarily need to cost an arm and a leg — even though some manufacturers would like you to think so. With that in mind, this month’s picks are a grab bag of affordable products, all under 10,000 yen (the ...
Receptacle for the respectable It wouldn’t seem that much could be done to improve on the functionality of the lowly water dispenser — all you need is a receptacle and a tap. Enter Kai House with the Adhoc product from their Kitchen Design Movement ...
The new year brings with it a perfect opportunity to make life improvements, or at least pretend to do so. This month’s column, therefore, is about making you more productive, better organized (with a touch of eco-related ingenuity), enhancing the air around you — ...
