Azuma Makoto – Collapsible Leaves

At the Gallery in Omotesando’s Gyre I saw the leaf art exhibition by Azuma Makoto. Born in Fukuoka in 1976 he has quickly become on of Japan’s most famous Ikebana artists using flowers, leafs, plants, moss and grass as his subject. All of the works in this exhibition was carefully made by hand in a process that must have take a lot of time. I really recommend putting his name in a Google Image search and enjoying the fabulous photos, or take a few moments to browse his personal blog. I really enjoyed the stark patterns that emerge from his works when viewed close up!

September Quick Fashion Check

Last night after walking through Shibuya snapping pictures of the bright streets I had time to take a few snaps of snappy people as well! Fashion is in that usual end of summer limbo, when no-one seems to be interested in the summer fashion but it’s way too hot to get started on autumn fashion. I give it a month more before we start seeing the usual autumn fashion items with one or two cool surprises. I took these photos in Shibuya, Omotesando and Harajuku. People who know Tokyo should be able to figure out the exact locations, if not you can always download an image and peek at the GPS information. Enojoy!

Cherry Blossoms – March 27th

On March 27th, on an abandoned lot near the back streets of Harajuku I came across this cherry tree in full bloom, a couple of days ahead of most trees in the metropolitan area. I am sure you’ll see thousands of images like these in the next few days as friends and family members blog, tweet and mail you the images they snap! Still, wouldn’t want to hold out on you so here goes, the first Tokyo cherry blossoms of the year here at Tokyobling! Enjoy!

Meiji Shrine – March 25th

Virtually every single person who visits Tokyo as a tourist makes sure to see the main shrine of the capital, the Meiji Jingu (Meiji Grand Shrine in English). I have blogged about this wonderfully beautiful shinto shrine in the heart of Tokyo many times before, but I believe that very few people (if any) have ever seen the shrine as I did on March 25th, just a few days ago. There were almost no visitors at all! Usually, even on weekday afternoons there are few visitors but even then the place is full of tourists and locals.

I managed to get a few shots of the main shrine almost deserted from visitors, but I hung out at the shrine long enough to get a fashion check kind of shot (didn’t really expect such a stylish visitor!) and two school girls in a very good mood. Enjoy, you probably won’t ever see this again!