Ayaka Mori– Author –

Walk into one of Japan's most satisfyingly unpretentious restaurants—a tiny ramen-ya tucked under a railway arch, a standing-only soba shop in a bustling train station, a curry joint that's been serving the same perfect plate for fifty y...

Walk down almost any commercial street in Japan, from a bustling Tokyo shotengai to a quiet station arcade in a rural town, and you’ll inevitably encounter them. Perfectly formed gyoza, glistening with a phantom crispiness. A bowl of ram...

You’ve probably seen them, even if you didn’t know their name. A perfect, fuzzy green sphere of moss, cradling a plant whose roots are mysteriously contained within. Sometimes they sit on a simple ceramic dish. Other times they hang in t...

Picture Japan in the early 1960s. The air is thick with the metallic scent of construction and the electric hum of ambition. The postwar recovery has kicked into high gear, birthing the famed economic miracle. Cities are rising from the ...

In the deep, snow-heavy parts of rural Japan, winter doesn’t so much end as it reluctantly dissolves. The world, muffled for months under a thick blanket of white, begins to drip. The sharp, clean scent of melting snow and damp earth fil...

Walk into a certain kind of cafe in Tokyo, and you might feel a strange sense of dislocation. The tables and chairs are ordinary enough. The low hum of conversation is familiar. But the walls are plastered with floor-to-ceiling images of...

The first time you see it, your brain stumbles. There, behind a pane of immaculate glass, is a perfect bowl of ramen. The broth has a deep, fatty sheen. The slices of chashu pork are delicately marbled. A soft-boiled egg, split open, rev...

Walk down almost any street in Japan, and you'll encounter them. They stand like silent sentinels on bustling Tokyo intersections, lean against the weathered walls of Kyoto temples, and offer a lonely glow on remote mountain passes where...

Walk into any modern game center in Japan—past the deafening rows of rhythm games and the claw machines with their plush, silent promises—and you will eventually find them. Tucked away in a brightly lit corner, a row of towering, kaleido...

Before you could tap a screen to buy Potions and Poké Balls, there was a real place you could go to stock up for the adventures of the day. It didn’t have a futuristic chime when you entered, but it had something better: the gentle rattl...

Imagine a Japan before the internet, before a thousand Instagram accounts could beam the sun-drenched aesthetic of Venice Beach skate culture directly into a teenager’s bedroom in suburban Tokyo. Picture the mid-1970s. The country was in...

To an outsider, it might look like just another photo booth, maybe one on a heavy dose of digital steroids. You see them tucked away in the glowing, cacophonous temples of modern leisure known as game centers, or occupying entire floors ...