Tokyo Toilet Tour
A tour of toilets may sound like an unusual activity to do, but the some of the top names in the Japanese architecture joined a project to redesign public restrooms in Tokyo's Shibuya district. If you are fans of Japanese contemporary architecture, then this will allow for a quick sample of the different style of each of the architects.
The names include Tadao Ando, Fumihiko Maki, Kengo Kuma and Sou Fujimoto. Industrial designer Marc Newson also contributed to this project. The first of the new toilets began appearing in 2020, and with the completion of Fujimoto's new toilet near the Park Hyatt Hotel, all 17 that was planned is now complete.
Despite all being within the borders of Shibuya-ku, the toilets are fairly scattered throughout the ward and requires some planning to visit.
The project has gotten some renewed interest after they were featured in the film "Perfect Days" by the German director Wim Wenders. In the film, Koji Yakusho plays the role of Hirayama, whose job is to clean the toilets. Yakusho won the Best Actor award in the Cannes Film Festival for his performance. The scenes were shot in October 2022 so some of the later works of the project did not get featured in the movie.
In addition to looking at the toilets and the locations featured in the film, the tour will go through some of the other highlights of the city, such as the Shibuya Intersection and the Miyashita Park. It will be a tour of Tokyo from a unique perspective.
How to book this tour:
Please send me a message through my contact form and I will reply with availability. I can meet at your hotel or can meet at one of the park where a toilet is located.
This a private tour (There won't be other groups joining you on the tour).
🕓Start time: 9am, 1pm, 1:30pm or 2pm (Tour duration is 3.5 Hours)
👪Number of people: Max of 4 people can participate.
💱Tour Fee: 28,000 JPY
🚉Transportation: A combination of walking and public transport.
The tour is also available from my booking page on TripAdvisor. Available dates will be released about 2 months in advance.
For a booking made through this route, the meeting location will be fixed as Yoyogi Fukamachi Mini Park (I will send further details after confirming the booking).
If you want to learn more about the toilet project itself, visit the Tokyo Toilet Project website
Note on Shigeru Ban's "Transparent Toilets"
The cubicles are transparent when there is no one inside. It uses light control film and when electricity is running the glass is transparent. The glass would become opaque when the door is locked.
A few months after its completion, unexpected problems with this system occurred during colder weather when the glass would take an extra few seconds before fogging. After complaints on social media, the city decided to keep the cubicles permanently opaque from mid October to mid May.
For 2025, the transparent feature was deactivated around October 20th.
Update May 10th, 2026
Was able to confirm that the transparent feature is now working again.
Also along the way...
Since we will be traveling through the Shibuya station area, the below attractions can also be ticked off your list during this tour.
What travelers say about this tour:
"This was the best tour we've ever taken in any city we've ever been to. We booked it because of Perfect Days and a love of architecture with the bonus of knowing we would get an intro to Tokyo public transportation from a local. Ken delivered. He was so kind and so knowledgeable. We learned so much more than we expected about this special public architecture project and about Tokyo more broadly. What a great introduction to this incredible city. Thank you, Ken! It was the perfect day!"
"This was a tour of the toilets and a few locations from the film Perfect Days. Idk how many people would be into that but if you’re as obsessed with the film as I am this is the tour for you! Just for context I flew from NY to Tokyo strictly because I found this tour. So yes…I was willing to spend 23 hrs to fly around the world to see public toilets. Don’t judge. Ken was on time, friendly, spoke English really well and was very knowledgeable. We had messaged a few times before the start of the tour to discuss the schedule and where we would meet and he always replied in a timely manner. The tour was about 4 hours long and was very well paced. He picked me up at my hotel and had planned the tour so that I was within walking distance of my hotel."
"We had a great tour with Ken Tanaka. In addition to the toilets he showed us highlights of Shibuya and the surrounding area, pointing out many things we would not have noticed ourselves and explaining them in an interesting manner. A great review of the toilets as art and architecture and an engaging introduction to Shibuya."
"Tolle Tour mit Ken! Man erfährt nicht nur etwas über die Toilettenhäuschen, sondern über die gesamte Gegend! Entdeckt Wohnbezirke in direkter Nachbarschaft zum Shibuya Station und bekommt noch Hinweise für weitere Unternehmungen. Sehr zu empfehlen!"
Perfect Days (2023)
Wim Wenders was invited to shoot a short film to promote this project. It ended up becoming a story of about 2 hours focusing on the life of Hirayama (played by Koji Yakusho) who works as a cleaner of the public toilets.
Wenders came to Tokyo in October 2022, just as the entry restriction related to COVID-19 was eased. At the time of the shooting, the toilet project was still a work in progress, so not all of the toilets made its way to the movie. It was several months after Wenders had arrived that the Sou Fujimoto designed toilet opened, marking the completion of all in the project.
Other scenes from the movie...
The spot where Hirayama always had his lunch is the Yoyogi Hachiman Shrine, located up the steps from the toilet by Toyo Ito.
You may recall the scene where he gets out his camera and takes a photo of the forest.
From here, it is also within close walking distance to the two transparent toilets designed by Shigeru Ban.
The remainder of the scenes were mostly shot in Asakusa and near the Tokyo Skytree on Tokyo's east side.
The business name in the movie all actually exist such as Fukuchan (the basement izakaya showing the baseball game on TV, located adjacent to Ginza Line Asakusa Station), Chikyudo (the used book store, 1-39-9 Asakusa, Taito-ku), Novu (the izakaya where the owner sings karaoke at request of the customer, 4-16-4 Asakusa, Taito-ku) and Denkiyu (public bath, 3-10-10 Kyojima, Sumida-ku).
Update Feb 2026: Novu closed in autumn 2025 and moved to another building near the Kaminarimon Gate. It no longer operates at the spot featured in the movie.
Hirayama's apartment is also an existing building, in use as a residence like in the movie. It is near the Koto Tenso Shrine.
