Amusingly, the obligatory maiko reference was illustrated with an image of regular women who happen to be wearing kimono. It’s a lesson to the real maiko that they needn’t bother with all that make up and hair hoo-ha.

“Tokyo ought to rank somewhere between Lagos and Tehran for quality of life. It’s the focal point of the most populous conurbation on the planet, and is one of the most crowded cities. It’s often expensive, always cacophonous and, at first glance, ugly as sin. The tourist bureau likes to show pictures of cherry blossom and Shinto shrines, but the real icons of this city are grey boxy offices and salarymen being stuffed into rush-hour trains.
Yet Tokyo is consistently rated one of the world’s most livable cities, and rightly so. It may not be as pretty as Paris, Athens or Rome, but it works like nowhere else on Earth. Those commuters that ride nose-to-stranger’s armpit arrive at their destination unruffled and on time, then set about making this extraordinary city tick.
I’m writing this in a coffee shop whose owner says, in seriousness, that his skills are comparable to the lightsaber technique of Obi-Wan Kenobi. He says it takes five years to learn how to make a
cappuccino, and he refuses to serve espresso after 2pm because he says he has to share the power grid with too many other people so the extraction will be too weak. He’s perfect fodder for a quirky Japan story. But you have to take him seriously because his coffee is sensational.

etc etc blah blah blah.”

Grab the pdf here

“… yet to find their first locations, Russian design firm Arch and Barcelona-based Dream & Fly have both developed all-in-one, standalone micro rooms designed for airports.

Arch’s Sleepbox will appeal to the Mac crowd with its all-white interior and curved edges, and comes equipped with wifi and fold-down laptop trays with power sockets. The boxes are designed to be self-sufficient, with payment made at a terminal. Sheets are wound around rollers, enabling them to be changed automatically.

Dream & Fly’s Bubbles are remarkably similar in design, and vary in size from 5m sq for single users to “family-sized” 10m sq. Each includes an LCD screen giving the latest flight info.”

“While most cities face the conflict of old versus new, Kyoto has proven adept at  synthesizing the two. Wooden townhouses that long ago ceased to be practical as living quarters are finding new lives as restaurants, art galleries, coffee shops and hair salons. A one-time kimono warehouse has become a stylish cocktail bar, and a former backstreet bathhouse is now a café furnished with plush sofas and bath-tile walls.

The kimono, a garment as impractical as it is beautiful, is still an everyday sight in Kyoto, but these days it might be emblazoned with a Marimekko-style print and paired with split-toe sneakers.”

The first Time Out guide to Kyoto was published September, 2009.

“Time Warp Atami is a town of boxy, white architecture freckled with olde-worlde coffee shops and “smart ball,” the low-tech precursor of pachinko that’s fiendishly difficult, but with perseverance and plenty of ¥500 coins might reward you with a 3-inch plastic baby or a pen.”