Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum

Located in Koganei Park, Tokyo, the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum features relocated and reconstructed buildings from the Edo to mid-Showa periods, offering insights into Japan’s architectural heritage.

Planning your visit

Tokyo destroys its buildings. Earthquake, firebombing and relentless redevelopment mean that almost nothing survives from before the war in most of the city, and the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum exists to save examples before they go.

Around thirty structures have been relocated to Koganei Park: farmhouses, a public bathhouse whose ornate frontage inspired the bathhouse in Spirited Away, a soy sauce shop, a tailor, a flower shop, a police box, a photographic studio, and the house of Korekiyo Takahashi, a prime minister assassinated there by young officers in 1936 — the room is preserved.

The Shitamachi east zone recreates a shopping street, and interiors are furnished so that visitors go inside and remove shoes.

The contrast between the wooden vernacular buildings and modernist houses by architects including Kunio Maekawa is instructive.

Bookable options include three-hour guided tours. Current availability is shown below.