The New Tokyo Toranomon Edition Is a Haven in the City Skies

In the weeks before I visited Tokyo in early November, I began to notice images of the city appearing on my Instagram feed with a curious regularity: the glittering lights of Shibuya Crossing, rare art tomes from the rambling second-hand bookstores of Jinbōchō, charred yakitori skewers grilling at a hole-in-the-wall Shinjuku izakaya. Most of those posting, I realized, were serious Japanophiles, and it turned out the reason for this swell of posts was simple. Just weeks before, the country had opened to tourists for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, and Tokyo’s groupies around the globe had, naturally, booked their flights faster than a bullet train.

All the same, seasoned travelers were returning to a changed city. Sure, there were the subtler details you might notice—the cultural norm of wearing masks in public is now all but ubiquitous, and what was once a cash-preferred city is now fully embracing contactless payments, even in mom-and-pop stores—but there have been more sweeping shifts too, not least in the number of Tokyo institutions, from restaurants to ryokans, that were forced to close as a result of the pandemic. At the same time, a new guard of hospitality venues has sprung up—all primed and ready to welcome in the new influx of tourists already streaming into the city after two years away.