My May 2025 Tokyo Travelogue - Part 4 Roppongi, Omotesando, Harajuku, Meiji Shrine, Shibuya

I wanted to bring up how having a decent breakfast bundled with your hotel room is a great way to start the morning. You start the day off more gradually by just going to the dining area and picking a table without a wait or overcrowding. It beats going down to the konbini (even if one is in the lobby of the hotel) and eating in your room or a dining bench.  You can pick your favourite foods from the buffet, including many Japanese specialties, and have a hearty breakfast with lots of fruit and vegetables + bacon! You can have several cups of coffee too and then head back up to your room to prepare for the day. I've done the konbini for breakfast many times, but a decent hotel breakfast is good to have. The only downside is that these breakfasts are going up in price like everything else in Japan!

May 14, 2025 WEDNESDAY Roppongi / Omotesando

Today is a museum / art gallery type of day. Roppongi has four major art venues. There is the Suntory Museum, the Mori Museum, 21-21 Design Sight, and the National Art Center. If you are in Tokyo, always check to see what is on while you are there!

When I was there, I had an interest in the following exhibitions, but only attended two:

• Who Is Shutendōji? Exhibit Suntory Museum of Art. 
• 21-21 Design Sight - Art of the Ramen Bowl
• Machine Love: Video Game, AI and Contemporary Art
• Celebrating 70 years of Godzilla.

The first exhibition I wanted to see was the Art of the Ramen Bowl. I love ramen and this exhibition showed some beautifully decorated ramen bowls from artists all around the world. Ramen is a global food these days and it was interesting to read how the artists were inspired to create their ramen bowls based on their experiences. The show also included items about how ramen bowls are made, the specific clays of Gifu for Mino ware pottery (most clay for ramen bowls comes from here), ceramics recycling, and 40 beautiful art piece ramen bowls. There were displays about ramen history, manga, and even a showroom of ramen bowls used by various restaurants around Japan. Very cool to see!

21_21 Design Site.

Front Entrance. It even looks like there is a ramen shop sign!

Art of the Ramen Bowl mural.

Ramen in Manga!

Ramen facts and a giant ramen bowl model.

Part of the 40 ramen bowls on display, they were decorated on the inside and outside.

Restaurant ramen bowls.

After the exhibit, we walked towards Roppongi Hills where the Mori Museum is. We passed a very cool looking neon sign display for Pe’z Magic Ears and Eyes Only burger restaurant. Its supposed to have great music and visuals + decent burgers from the reviews I read.

There were exhibits on at the National Art Center, but nothing we were too interested in. The building is gorgeous and the interior is spectacular. In the movie, Your Name, this is where the protagonist goes for a lunch date!

National Art Center Exterior.

Wavy outer wall and cool circular cafe and restaurants on inverted conical pillars.

The restaurants from the side view.

Roppongi Hills with the Mori tower soon loomed ahead. About 15 or 20 minutes to walk there from Design Site. 

You don't cross the freeway here. Take the underpass to get across to the tower!

The famous Mamon the spider statue. A common meeting place.

Godzilla exhibit

It wasn't even Godzilla Week or Godzilla Festival (last one was on November 3rd 2024) time and there was a fair bit of Godzilla in my visit. Not enough Gundam or other favourite anime, but lots of Godzilla and big Godzilla statues. I did want to see this 70th Anniversary, Godzilla The Art Exhibition though at the Mori Museum. Many exhibits are just some statues, production art, and props, but this one was different as it was about how various artists saw Godzilla or want to create a theme with Godzilla in it. This movie monster has inspired a great many creatives over the years! It was a fun exhibit to take in and there were miniature movie type sets and big models too.

The ruins of the first room that welcomes you to the exhibit!

Some big dioramas that Godzilla could stomp.

More dioramas on tables to give you a sense of scale.

There were many art pieces too, but I'm only showing the big models and dioramas. There were some pieces with no photography permitted.

This was the centerpiece diorama of Godzilla towering over a partially destroyed cityscape.

The big centerpiece diorama of Godzilla towered over you and it had a full light and sound show that went with it. There were roars, music, all types of lighting and flashing effects along with explosions in the background. Fun to watch a few times. You could walk around the diorama and shoot pictures from all angles.

Godzilla and a ruined freeway.

I wouldn't want to be in that train car.

He looks appropriately menacing in this shot.

I did say there were explosions!

After the exhibit, it was time for lunch and we didn't want to hunt around for a place to eat. It was past the main lunch hour and we settled for the restaurant on the museum floor which had a great view of Toranomon Hills, Azabudai Hills, and the Tokyo Tower! We got to dine with some great scenery.

The Skytree can be seen on the horizon about a quarter of the way in on the left side.

Closeup of some buildings.

The Mori Tower at Azabudai Hills and the Tokyo Tower.

I had something off the Godzilla menu for lunch to stay on theme! There were these Godzilla Burgers that were all black - it is usually bamboo charcoal mixed in.

A coupl of the dishes on the menu. Many of the restaurants in the complex had some type of Godzilla special on.

A pretty good burger with the big Godzilla-spines of corn chips sticking out the top. Godzilla never tasted so good!

These are some vinyl figures of the original Godzilla model. He has changed a lot since then. There was lots of artistic merchandise.

After lunch we headed over to Omotesando / Harajuku. I wanted to see the new Tokyu Plaza Harajuku and maybe revisit Tokyu Plaza Omotesando.

• Tokyu Plaza Harajuku (Harakado) – art on 3F, front of bath B1F, the roof decks, 2F local brands Tokyu Plaza Omotesando – Starbucks, rooftop forest.

Both of these are very interesting small shopping / entertainment buildings. They are small malls? Both of them have rooftop gardens where people can eat food and enjoy the fresh air and views. This isn't so popular in the rain or in the winter, but very popular at other times of the year. My favourite Starbucks is the one on the roof at Tokyu Plaza Omotesando. The new Tokyu Plaza Harajuku is definitely designed to be more of a casual get together place for food and drink than the other Tokyu Plaza across the street. There are several floors set up like a food hall with many different restaurants to choose from.

Tokyu Plaza Harajuku with the terraced rooftop garden. Lots of people sit on the wide stairs here.  Lots of tables and benches too.

Front Entrance.

A food hall floor in Tokyu Plaza Harajuku.

View of Tokyu Plaza Omotesando from the TTokyu Plaza Harajuku.

We went to visit Takeshita Street. It was super crowded and many of the cool little shops that used to be here are gone. More chains and bigger shops with bigger backers.

Takeshita Street Crowds. Not as many Harajuku girls too, but tons of tourists!

There was a Gundam collaboration for many T-Shirts at UNIQLO.

Inside UNIQLO Harajuku. There is a T-Shirt Corner here where you can make custom T-Shirts and also find Shibuya/Harajuku only local T-Shirt patterns!

There is IKEA here in the same new building where you can get home furnishings or just a cheap snack/drink and seat.

After shopping for some more T-Shirts and seeing the new UNIQLO and IKEA venues we walked a short distance to visit Meiji Jingu shrine before it closed in the early evening.

The giant torii gate at the entrance to Meiji Jingu.

The wild woodlands around the shrine that you walk through are a very diverse biome with plenty of wild animals and insects. It is a completey man-made park with trees from all over Japan. The forest is century old now and it is a lush piece of wild greenery.

The famous saki barrel wall for various corporate sponsors of the shrine.

An inner torii at the shrine.

The gatehouse to the inner shrine. You still go in further to another gatehouse which is the entrance to the actual inner shrine / main hall. It is here you can pray and make donations as the actual inner compound and main hall are off limits to visitors.

We left as the shrine was closing - it was a long day - and we went on the Yamanote Line down to Shibuya which is only one stop away. Here we would see the evening crowds on Center Gai, the main street here.and get dinner. I hadn't had enough ramen yet, so I wanted to try Kamukura Ramen here.

Evening at the Shibuya Scramble Crossing.

Kamukura Ramen.

I had an order of gyoza and nice bowl of ramen. Their soup here is so good and flavourful with a vegetable and bone broth. It is clear broth and this ramen is full of veggies too!

Center Gai in Shibuya. There are way more TV screens with some really big ones here now.

Center Gai and the biggest screen on the street where the merry go round horse is displayed. There are many interesting animations and ads playing here. There was even an animation of the evil gods from Solo Levelling playing.

A crowded Shibuya Crossing at Night.

Scramble Square with its giant inverted triangular TV display. The raised platform for the Ginza line is in front of it. The Hikarie building is to the left with its super high up and free viewing deck.

After dinner and a short walk around it was time to head back to the hotel. The Ginza line takes us right back to within a block of our hotel!

Part 1 Shibuya, Kanda Festival, Azabudai Hills (Teamlab), Akihabara, Ueno 
Part 2 Day Trip to Mount Takao, Tengu, and Gotokuji Temple 
Part 3 Enoshima Day Trip and Odaiba Gundam
Part 4 May 2025 Tokyo Travelogue - Part 4 Roppongi, Omotesando, Harajuku, Meiji Shrine, Shibuya

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