The Cutest Cotton Squids

While walking through Tokyo’s Aoyama district the other day I saw these cotton squids hung up to dry inside a small family style restaurant. What a great design and fun idea! I especially love their little eyes. Now, who will make a whole family of these to hang in their windows? Sock puppet squids!

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Cuddly Superman Meets Cuddly Batman

I just love these toys I found in a Daikanyama shop window the other day. Too bad I am trying to reduce the clutter in my life (one can dream… one can dream…), otherwise these little buddies would be perfect in my kitchen! I love how the Japanese are so good at mashing up (or possibly in this case, enjoying mashed up) culture. Enjoy!

Isetan Christmas Campaign

Nothing beats window shopping, especially in a country like Japan where the prices are high and the window decorations are fantastic. Here’s the latest christmas window decoration campaign from Isetan in Tokyo’s Shinjuku district called “How to Make Wonder Christmas”. While their copy writers will never win gold medals they sure struck gold when they found the amazing Finnish illustrator Klaus Haapaniemi to decorate their shops from inside and out. The windows are meant to be seen in a series and shows a christmas fairy tale in each window, 12 in all. The characters from the story then returns inside the store as statues, ceiling decorations and floor stickers. At the information desk you can pick up beautiful little pamphlets with more details of the story.

The shop windows are even animated and interactive with a live video feed that will track your face on the sidewalk and add animated features to turn you into a reindeer- or an owl-character on an in window-display. Fun for all ages. They also have a service where you can download animations for your cellphone and a campaign site. If you are in Tokyo over christmas, I recommend you stop by Isetan in Shinjuku and see the cutting edge in store window design.

Edit (2010 August 31st): I just found the redesign Klaus Haapaniemi made of one of my favorite books ever, Patrick Süskind’s “Perfume”. Have a look here! His book designs are absolutely gorgeous!

Shop Decoration – Cats

I love these statues of three cats with chop sticks outside a (you guessed it!) chop stick (in Japanese: ohashi) shop in Tokyo’s Omotesando district. The sign says “eigyouchuu” which means open for business. A good little set of characters to learn to recognize while traveling in Japan.