UNIQLO launches UT POP-UP! TYO inside empty Toyoko Shibuya Station

Written by: Nicholas Goluch on April 1, 2013 at 10:51 am | In LIFESTYLE | 1 Comment

As we’ve mentioned previously on JapanTrends, the Tokyu Toyoko line has recently merged with the underground Fukutoshin subway line at Shibuya Station. The merge has made the commute from outside of the city faster, and the Fukutoshin a little more useful. It’s also left a pretty hefty space left wide open in Shibuya station.

Whether you live in Tokyo, or not, it’s safe to say you know what a crowded city it is. There are literally millions of people in the streets at all times. Shops, restaurants, vending machines and train stations occupy every tiny space. If you want to get really particular, there are even all of the above within the train stations. Finding space for a new shop in Tokyo can be a pretty tough job.

So, in the spirit of no space wasted, UNIQLO has opened a pop-up t-shirt shop called UNIQLO UT POP-UP! TYO on the Toyoko platform. Literally on the platform.

While you’re sifting through hundreds of t-shirt designs, if you take a moment to look down, you’ll notice that the tracks are right below your feet. Or that you’re walking along the yellow line you’ve been so conditioned to stay behind.

The shop has more than 1,000 varieties of UNIQLO t-shirts, and boasts an inventory of over 12,000 garments on hand for sale. Given that this is a one-of-a-kind opportunity for a shop like this to exist, UNIQLO is launching 100 new designs while the shop is open.

UNIQLO actually has a history with train stations, having for a few years now already been operating mini branches (more pop-in than pop-up) inside the ticket barriers of major terminals, including JR Shibuya. This is also not the first store dedicated to its UT (UNIQLO T-shirts) line either, though it is the biggest.

The Toyoko Station pop-up is only open until April 7, so get down there and see it for yourself. And, you can get a t-shirt too!

Tags: Fashion, Retail, Transportation, uniqlo
Category: LIFESTYLE
Other categories: CULTURE, PRODUCT INNOVATION

Tokyu Hands celebrates Valentine’s Day with in-store Shinto Love Shrine

Written by: William on February 4, 2013 at 11:27 am | In CULTURE | No Comments

Shinto, the native Japanese (quasi-?)religion, has never been averse to merchantile environs. Major corporations have their own shrines (jinja) and department stores may often have one on their roofs. No Jesus cleansing the traders out of the temple in this religion, that’s for sure.

Until Valentine’s Day, Tokyu Hands Hakata (Fukuoka) is also showing no qualms about bringing a jinja into the “den of thieves”.

In the store visitors will find a torii gate like the kind you pass through at the entrance to a Shinto shrine. The heart-themed design of the fake shrine is a copy of the actual Koinoki Jinja, the shrine for lovers located elsewhere in Fukuoka prefecture.

At the “shrine” you can buy a love fortune (omikuji) for ¥100, write a message and then post it on the heart-shaped board. At the end of the promotion, all the “offerings” will be collected and taken to the real Koinoki Jinja.

The same area of the store has also been holding chocolate-making workshops for those girls who want to give something unique on February 14th (in Japan, the women give the men something on Valentine’s Day, and then the men return the favor on March 14th).

Other than Koinoki Jinja, shrines famed as places to acquire fortune in romance include Kuzuryu Shrine, near Mt. Fuji, and Kasuga Taisha in Nara. Tokyoites can console their lonely hearts by heading to Imado Jinja in Asakusa or Tokyo Daijingu in Iidabashi.

Tags: Retail, Traditions, Women
Category: CULTURE
Other categories: LIFESTYLE, PRODUCT INNOVATION

Apple’s 2013 Lucky Bags certain to be massive

Written by: William on December 26, 2012 at 6:15 pm | In LIFESTYLE | No Comments

Apple is proving that despite being a foreign brand in Japan, it takes its local customers very seriously.

The manufacturer’s legions of Japanese fans can get their hands on Apple Lucky Bags on January 2nd, available at the seven Apple stores in the country for one day only.

Lucky Bags (Fukubukuro) are a stable of Japanese New Year traditions and are often a fun way to get a great deal.

While it might not be a new iPhone release, we still anticipate that there will be long lines from the early hours, filled mostly with guys, no doubt, hungry to land whatever goodies are inside the lucky bags.

There were long queues braving the cold at the Ginza and Shibuya stores last year when Apple did the same thing.

[Image source]

Could it be an iPad? A MacBook?

For ¥33,000 (about $390) you could get a real bargain — or it might just be a load of cables.

Still, there is apparently at least one guy already waiting…

[Image source]

Tags: Apple, Retail
Category: LIFESTYLE
Other categories: CULTURE, PRODUCT INNOVATION

Swarovski-style Lawson in Hikarie is sparkling luxury convenience store

Written by: William on November 15, 2012 at 9:03 am | In LIFESTYLE | No Comments

Lawson, Japan’s second biggest convenience store, has a good knack of adapting itself to fit its surroundings, a kind of chameleon chain.

We noticed one great example of this recently.

Hikarie, the swanky shopping plaza that opened this spring in Shibuya, is not above offering its patrons the delights of the super cheap products you can browse in a conbini. But the store itself on the eleventh floor of the complex still has to fit in with the rest of the decor.

[Image source]

Lawson did this par excellence here, adding Swarovski Crystal-style glittering diamonds to create a “gorgeous” luxury-looking branch that Hikarie’s largely female shoppers will love snapping shots of with their iPhones.

Saying that, it also slightly resembles a starry night sky — ironically, since, Hikarie is owned by Tokyu, which also operates the popular planetarium in Shibuya that you can see from the windows of the new shopping mall.

[Image source]

We also like the designer Lawson on Inokashira-dori, near the plush Yoyogi Uehara neighborhood, which is on the ground floor of a fancy condo and thus has spruced itself up to fit in — even emitting gentle blue lights that seem to hum in the night like an illumination show.

Tags: Convenience Stores, Retail
Category: LIFESTYLE
Other categories: CULTURE, PRODUCT INNOVATION