A visiting architect-friend of mine described Tokyo colorfully as “an urban disaster with shit-piled-upon-shit”. Seeing my slightly annoyed face, he thoughtfully added “but it is fascinating shit”. This is a stereotypical reaction I have heard many times over, and not only from visitors. The Japanese themselves, architects as well as non-architects mutter an apologetic reference to European cities when we talk about Tokyo. Kenzo Tange once said that Tokyo has had many times over the chance to rebuild itself: after the Great Earthquake of 1923 or after the World War Ⅱ bombings, but according to Tange the rebuilding from an urban design’s point of view always failed. Did Tokyo, the world’s largest urban entity, really fail?

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Each week at a section on its website called “aspara club,” the Asahi Shimbun polls some 8,000 registered “be monitors.” The results then appear each Saturday in the print edition’s supplement, in a department called “be between.”

“The question for the July 26 edition was, “Do you feel women’s summer garb is too extreme?” Of the 4,361 valid responses, 80% replied in the affirmative. Of these, nearly equal numbers objected to flashing of too much skin (2,189 responses) and allowing undergarments or navel to be exposed (2,011 responses).

Asked which garments were unsuitable to be worn at the workplace, 3,320 respondents named camisoles—which originally functioned as an undergarment.

“Seeing women nonchalantly wearing something that looks like underwear is really unpleasant,” a 67-year-old Tokyoite tells Asahi.”

Is Japan’s flirt with recession merely a side effect of the high temperatures?  

Jun Mitsui’s point that Japan is becoming a disposal ground, a toilet for foreign architects, is funny indeed, but I think rather outdated. Most of the interesting architecture in Japan these days comes from young Japanese architects, the days of foreign dumpings (potty training would be a better description), in my opinion are over. Don’t forget that most of the shit built here is by Japanese architects.

The new Peninsula, dumped according to the new colour regulations?

1. Japan has the highest pro-capita rate of architects, of the 1.2million registered architects world-wide Japan has over 300,000,

2. There are very few aesthetic regulations: anything goes,

3. In the chaos architects work hard to make their buildings stand-out,

4. Tokyo has some of the world’s most daring and cash-rich clients,

5. Japanese construction companies (not only the major ones) are the world’s most advanced,

6. Buildings have an average life-span of around 30 years,

7. The city has been destroyed many times over (and most likely will be again soon).

1. Bury all the electrical poles, and while doing that fix the Tokyo sewers. A first great step to make Tokyo not to look and smell like shit.

2. Push for a clear definition of what it means to be an architect here in Japan, push for a separate license for a “structural engineer”. Enough First Class Licensed Architect Aneha-shit!

3. Introduce some design guidelines for urban planning and architecture that goes beyond shadow zoning. (But make sure that Kurokawa will not be chairing this board)

4. Make at least 10% of the roads in Tokyo’s centres car-free. All the time! Too bad for those coming from Saitama trying to show off their sporty cars (Boom! Boom! Boom! Sunglasses! Cabriolet! Saitama license plate!) in Shibuya’s shopping streets.

5. Plant some trees in the city, add more parks. Tokyo has the lowest number of parks/person among capital cities in the world. But make sure to vary the type of trees! (Note: have a serious discussion with Chiba to reduce the air-born pollen from their trees floating into Tokyo. We don’t want to be number one hay fever capital in the world anymore.)