One of the last things we did in Tokyo was to try and tie together our Expo experience by looking for this remnant of one that never happened. The K-Museum, designed by Makoto Sei Watanabe and completed in 1996 on the Odaiba waterfront, was conceived as part of World City Expo ’96 which aimed to showcase Tokyo’s hidden infrastructure through futuristic architecture and educational exhibits. But that mega-event was abruptly canceled in 1995 by the newly elected Governor Yukio Aoshima, who opposed its massive costs, leaving projects like the K-Museum without their intended context. This upset a lot of countries who had already committed to taking part.
K-Museum opened briefly from 1997 to 2001 but failed to attract visitors, was closed, and eventually dismantled in 2024—something I didn’t realize when we went looking for it, so was quite underwhelmed by what we found. But here it is. The ghost location of an almost-landmark. x
Elsewhere on the waterfront, this character (花) right by the big convention center known as Tokyo Big Sight, pronounced huā in Chinese and hana in Japanese, meaning “flower” in both languages.
In Japanese, 花 is used in words like:
• 花火 (hanabi) — fireworks, literally “flower fire” • 花見 (hanami) — cherry blossom viewing • 花道 (hanamichi) — the “flower path” in kabuki theater
It’s also a name like @hana.m.cooper’s 🌸 x
We also made a detour to @tokyodomecity_official where I got a @yomiuri.giants baseball cap and we had @nanasgreentea_official — worth it in and of itself, but also beautiful in the golden hour sun ☀️🎡 x