Japan Pulse

Photo credit: 177/Flickr

When supercool French music/fashion label Kitsune opens its temporary storefront in Omotesando next week, it will be the latest brand to dot Tokyo’s cityscape with a pop-up shop, those small, ephemeral retail venues that hip brands erect in high-traffic hot spots. The idea of a pop-up retail is usually to generate buzz and give the unsuspecting consumers who stumble onto the place the illusion of inside knowledge. Pop-up stores frequently sell limited-edition goods, as well, so an added exclusivity is built right in.

Last year saw a number of successful campaigns: Louis Vuitton built an underground lair in Ikebukuro while Ace Hotel set up an enclave inside Isetan Department store. Brand [RED] set up shop inside Harajuku’s Gap outlet while forward-thinking architecture firm, Klein Dytham, designed a temporary gallery, bar and livehouse at the top of the H&M building for Vitamin Water’s Japan launch.

Pop-up retail has been around for a while. Long enough, in fact, that scenesters like Kitsune now feel they need to differentiate themselves for the concept. They’re also incorporating locally-made materials, which will add value for many of Japan’s shopaholics. Some say the pop-up shop idea is played out, or rather becoming common enough to lose its edge. Fine with me. Perhaps it’s time for the pop-up shop to go family friendly.

Tama Home store on the platform of the Yamanote line in Shibuya

Last year we reported that cosmetic stores had been popping up on train platforms, allowing busy women to stock up on beauty products while they wait for trains. Now it seems the idea has caught on with real-estate vendors Tama Home, who have installed themselves on the Yamanote Line platform of Shibuya Station.

The shop doubles as a café for busy commuters, offering coffee at the low price of ¥200, or for free if you don’t mind filling out a questionnaire. Visitors can also get advice from shop staff about real estate and probably will hear a lot about the benefits of buying a brand new Tama home.

The marketing concept of having Tama Home on the train platform might be down to the fact that home is pronounced “houmu” in Japanese and the same word means station platform, making it a neat little pun. But why place a real-estate agency in Shibuya, an area renowned attracting footloose youths who are not necessarily potential home buyers?

Tama Home’s advertising used to concentrate on appealing to couples with young children with a typical commercial showing a happy family innocently singing a simple song about the joys of living in a Tama Home: “Happy life, happy home, Tama Home!” Falling birth rates must have put a dent in their staple market because they’ve now recruited the dashing Takuya Kimura to appear in a new series of advertisements. Most decidedly single, he’s depicted struggling with the confines of a tiny bachelor pad and yearning not for a mate but for more space.

While the Tama Home platform store is built to resemble a train carriage, for sheer perfection of product placement, nothing beats the Gatan Goton store located on the platform of Tsuruhashi train station in Osaka. Gatan Goton (the noise trains make when they roll over rails) sells model train sets for enthusiasts both young and old and even has a little model railway set out in the center. Houses purchased at the store go for considerably less than those at Tama Home.

The hype surrounding augmented reality (AR) technology is often dwarfed by coverage of 3D television,  but that may change once both are put into practice on a broad scale. AR could prove to change lives more profoundly, not only by locating subway stations or inviting Robert Downey Jr. into your cubicle, but also by providing information about anything or anyone at which you point your device.

The Sekai Camera iPhone app grabbed headlines in Japan last year, and several new Japanese applications may indicate what to expect in the coming decade. The Red Cross is using face-recognition software and anime hair to attract blood donors in Akihabara, and the pin@clip application is now being tested in Shibuya, allowing iPhone users to get real-time information on shopping and entertainment options in the buildings that users pass by.

Continue reading about augmented reality in Japan →

If technology is truly meant to bring us all closer together, then recent translation services are doing their part to make the world a smaller place.

Flashy items like NEC’s translation glasses and the new iPhone application that can convert text from pictures will get plenty of attention once they’re tested and widely distributed, but in 2009 a number of other innovations have already begun to affect how Japan’s residents interact with the world and each other.

Google has certainly been at the forefront. Their “Translate this page” links are now built into Japanese search results, and the dedicated Translate application has made huge strides in turning select phrases, web pages and PDF documents into your preferred tongue. Google Reader has opened the blogosphere even further with the option to change RSS feeds into English or other languages. Twitter, the year’s other web darling, continues to grow in popularity here, and the Tweetie iPhone application’s translate function is helping more non-Japanese speakers to keep better track of the country’s 140-character community.

Continue reading about translation services →

Free manga browsing at a convenience store

In a recent interview with Monocle Magazine, Japanamerica author and pop culture stalwart Roland Kelts was asked about Meiji University’s plans for a manga library. “When you make a Rock and Roll museum, it means that Rock and Roll is dead,” he said. “And when you build a manga museum, to some extent it means that there is an end in sight.”

Perhaps in its present form, yes. Kelts doesn’t believe that manga are going away, but domestic sales are down, with print media competing with – and frequently losing to – digital platforms on cell phones and the Internet. Don’t worry, he explains, manga are just in the process of adapting to the new landscape. Downloadable manga for your cell phone are but one example.

Continue reading about evolving forms of manga →

Now this is a fantastic idea. The Japanese firm Mobile Art Lab has turned the iPhone into an interactive children’s book with what they’re calling the PhoneBook.

This is not the first iPhone-related program aimed at your toddler – you could spend hours looking through all the child-related applications available on iTunes – but this approach, with its book-like accessory framing the touchscreen, is an idea that is bound to catch on. Mobile Art Lab has stated that these kind of applications are not limited to children’s books, but could also be utilized in other types of media such as catalogs and brochures. Graphic novels and manga could easily integrate this technology as well, but the interactive potential makes this an ideal learning tool.

Next up, Dr. Seuss: Is there an app for that?

Japan’s pet population has grown by over 9 million in the last 10 years. Cats figure into the equation, but it’s the present “dog boom” that gets the most attention, with the spotlight shining on more and more services available for Japan’s canine lovers. In addition to clothing lines and custom-made birthday cakes, dog owners can now keep a memento of their deceased four-legged friend after their death, in what now marks a complete cradle-to-grave cycle.

What’s not mentioned as frequently is how the grave-end of this cycle presents itself to many unwanted pets. Some estimates show that over 300,000 dogs a year are now being put down around the country. There is no simple answer as to why so many pets are abandoned, or even bought in the first place, although it has been argued that Japan’s love of cute and the difficulties of raising children play a role.

Continue reading about the pet boom →

To rent, touch your IC card to the pad

"Tabi chari" for rent

A trial scheme to provide unsupervised bicycle rental around the Marunouchi district in Chiyoda-ku was launched today. The Community Cycle project which runs until Nov. 30  is a collaboration between Japan’s Environment Ministry and JTB travel agency and is aimed at getting more cars off the roads.

We got a glimpse of the very funky-looking tabi chari (travel bikes) this weekend when we were pottering around the area. While looking very hip, our one criticism is that the wheels seemed rather small; as the area covered by the scheme itself is rather minuscule, perhaps they were hoping that people would get tired out before they pedaled away with the merchandise.

The project cleverly makes use of IC cards, which are already a popular means on payment for transport around Tokyo. Credit is put onto cards such as Suica or PASMO at machines found in train stations and payment is made by touching the card to a device that deducts payment for your train journey or bike rental as the case may be. The initial initial registration costs ¥1,000, and rentals within 30 minutes are free.

Similar community bicycle projects have been very successful in Europe; Japan’s low crime rate almost guarantees success, so we’re looking forward to seeing more of these bike stands around the city in the future.