Tokyo Shinkai Tour

as part of my 2026 expeditions (more blogs coming soon), i arrived in tokyo on the 29th of july. on the first day i had free from work to go out and explore, i set out to make a long time dream of mine come true. on the 31st of july 2026, i went on my makoto shinkai tour.

since first watching garden of words in 2018, and then watching your name the next night, and then the next night, and perhaps even the next night after that... i have been a huge fan of the work of makoto shinkai. as someone who went into the first movie being somewhat an anime hater, the 45 minute run of garden of words changed my mind fast. the visuals, ost composition and compelling story immediately astounded me. your name was the same but tenfold. i had never seen a movie before where every single frame was a masterpiece.

i have met various people from around the world through these movies, some being lifelong friends. it was no wonder why i was so excited to discover that the locations from the movies are almost all entirely based off of real locations that i could visit one day.

that day came at the end of july 2026.

there is also something in this for me as a designer. i have had these skylines, staircases and gardens burned into my brain for eight years, and visiting them meant seeing how much of that atmosphere was already in the real place, and how much shinkai built. after rebuilding many real locations for site maps and renders in my work, i can only hold utmost appreciation for shinkai's ability to breathe such wonder into these places whilst staying so faithful to the real thing.

i visited each location after finding them on google maps, aligned the shot and enjoyed the relevant ost with my headphones. in one day i covered all top priority locations, did 35k+ steps and even stopped for lunch in the very restaurant taki works in from your name (and surprisingly they did have toothpicks, iykyk).

this day holds a lot of meaning to me, as it was one of many items on my bucket list that i have been fortunate enough to tick off just within this year. i still want to visit lake suwa (itomori), but that is for another time. i know my time in japan has not come to an end, so it's nice to leave things to look forward to.

the pictures are not the best quality, due to being from my iphone, then being zoomed and cropped to align properly with those from the movies. i have definitely developed more of an appreciation for photography this year, so perhaps in the future i will upgrade and buy myself a full dedicated camera.

on my last day in tokyo, i found the japanese your name art book in an airport store and just had to buy it. at a price of something as low as £7 i felt obligated to purchase it and struggle even more to fit anything new into my luggage. i see this being a perfect addition to my future dream apartment's coffee table and it is full of beautiful concept art, particularly architectural for the settings.

i look forward to the next shinkai announcement and movie and will be sure to visit any real locations from that. his movies never seem to miss.

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disclaimers

you may notice that the date of the blog on the website doesn't align with the date of the trip, and that is intentional. this website overhaul has been a wip for a couple of months as i juggle work life, social life and exploring, and it is just now ready to go live. i thought it would be nice to have one proper personal blog on the site at the time of launch and i was quite eager to share these pictures.

all pictures from the anime are not mine. they are from the works of makoto shinkai and comixwave films. i do not own them or claim to. i have just included them on this page for comparison with my own photography.