Miyu Kojima's models of the apartments she has help clean after the deaths of their tenants can be hard to look at, but they also reveal the empathy needed to be able to continue in such a difficult line of work.

Eighty-one-year-old Sachiko Miura wakes up at 6 a.m. every day to prepare breakfast at her newly renovated apartment located near a large supermarket, spa and a hospital in the suburbs of Japan's third largest city. After cleaning her room and doing her laundry, she takes ...

A dying craft, sentō (public bathhouse) painting now has just three artisans continuing the art form. Can interest in Japanese culture, sparked by the 2020 Olympics, help renew an appreciation for the stunning murals?

The nation should expect the frequency of powerful typhoons and heavy rains to grow with global warming, says a professor at the Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research at Nagoya University.

Albert Kuwano Bakonyvari beckons me inside his factory's steam chamber, where hundreds of plump, white, crescent-shaped gyōza dumplings are neatly lined on stacks of trays fitted in steel racks, waiting to be sent to the freezer. "Want to try one? I bet you haven't eaten ...

White Rose Co. invented the plastic umbrella in the 1950s when Mitsuo Sudo was inspired by vinyl tablecloths brought to Japan by occupation forces. Now it's just one of few makers weathering the storm of cheap, mass-produced imports.

Onsen hot spring baths may reign in Japan, but the Western sauna could be the next health and wellness trend.

Tsukishima is among many districts being gentrified by giant condominium projects popping up in the most populous city in the world.

An unidentified animal howl recorded in the Okuchichibu mountains bears a strong resemblance to a wolf howl, according to an analysis of audio samples provided by Hiroshi Yagi, an independent researcher who has been working to prove the existence of the officially extinct Japanese ...

It's a scorching summer afternoon with temperatures crawling toward 37 degrees Celsius. Kadota Inari Shrine is empty except for a chorus of screeching cicadas and the smooth stone statues of foxes guarding its entrance. Hanging on either side of the shrine are hundreds of small ...