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Tuesday, December 24, 2019

Nezu Museum (根津美術館), Tokyo, Japan

Copyright © 2019 Douglas R. Wong, all rights reserved.

This article was updated on 19 Sep 2021 to clarify taking the train or subway to get to the museum.

The Nezu Museum (根津美術館, Nezu Bijutsukan) is an art museum in the Minato district of Tokyo, Japan. The museum houses the private collection of pre-modern Japanese and East Asian art of Nezu Kaichirō (1860–1940), the former President of Tōbu Railway, and is built on Nezu's former residence and garden. Closed due to large-scale renovation and renewal in 2006, the museum re-opened in fall 2009 with a completely new museum building designed by the noted Japanese architect Kuma Kengo [1]. Kuma Kengo was also the architect for the modern redesign of the Akagi Shrine, which I reviewed in this earlier article: 

One of the defining architectural features of the Nezu Museum is the street entrance. The photograph of the entrance at the beginning of this article is the museum's most identifiable feature and is a tribute to Kuma Kengo's skill as an architect. As the museum is a very popular with both tourists and locals, it is really hard to get a photo without someone walking through it!

While it is worth a visit to view the art exhibits at the Nezu Museum when you're in Tokyo, for me the real reason to visit the museum is to see the garden. The site not only contains the museum, but also four tea houses and statuary within the garden. I last visited the museum on 29 Nov 2017, when the Fall colors were the most prominent and the garden most picturesque. Read the rest of the article to find out more information, and see more photographs of the museum and gardens.

Friday, December 20, 2019

Yuasa Soy Sauce (湯浅醤油有限会社), Yuasa, Japan

Copyright © 2019 Douglas R. Wong, all rights reserved.

This article was updated on 19 Sep 2021 to clarify the train trip to Yuasa Station and the factory.

Everyone loves ice cream, but ice cream was not the reason I made a trip to see this factory in Yuasa, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. The ¥400 ice cream cone was an added bonus for visiting and it is a unique flavor that is a specialty for this place. The flavor of this ice cream is soy sauce and you can try it at the café attached to the Yuasa Soy Sauce factory. Soy sauce ice cream is not salty in taste (as one might think), and is a nice tasty treat after touring the factory. Please read the rest of the article to find out more about touring the factory and the real reason why I made a special repeat trip here.

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