Explore Tokyo

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building in Shinjuku is the seat of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, designed by Kenzo Tange and completed in 1990. Its 243-metre main tower divides into two at the 33rd floor; each half has an observation room on the 45th floor, 202 metres up, with views across the city and, on clear days, to Mount Fuji.

Meiji Jingu is a Shinto shrine dedicated to the deified spirits of Emperor Meiji and Empress Shōken, dedicated in 1920 and rebuilt in 1958 after the 1945 air raids destroyed it. It stands in a 70-hectare forest of trees donated from all over Japan, beside Yoyogi Park; wooden torii mark the gravel paths to the main hall.

Yasukuni Shrine is a Shinto shrine in Chiyoda, founded in 1869, that commemorates about 2.5 million people who died in Japan's service, from the Boshin War to the Second World War. Among them are 1,068 convicted war criminals, 14 of them Class A, which makes the shrine politically contested; the Yūshūkan war museum stands on its grounds.

The Tokyo Imperial Palace is the residence of the Emperor of Japan, laid out on the site of Edo Castle in Chiyoda. The palace buildings are seen only on guided tours, but the East Gardens show the stone base of the castle keep, the Ninomaru garden and old guardhouses, and the outer gardens look across the moat to the stone bridges and the Fushimi turret.

Tsukiji Outer Market is a quarter of narrow streets in Tsukiji, central Tokyo, lined with wholesale and retail food shops and small restaurants. It grew up beside the Tsukiji wholesale fish market, opened in 1935; when the wholesale trade moved to Toyosu in 2018 the outer market stayed, selling seafood, dried bonito, tamagoyaki, kitchen knives and tableware.

Ueno Park is a public park in Taitō, Tokyo, opened in 1873 on land that had belonged to the temple Kan'ei-ji, one of Japan's first public parks. It holds the Tokyo National Museum, the National Museum of Western Art, the National Museum of Nature and Science and Ueno Zoo, along with Shinobazu Pond and its lotus beds and about 1,200 cherry trees.

Sensō-ji is the oldest-established Buddhist temple in Tokyo, dedicated to the bodhisattva Kannon; tradition dates it to 628, when two fishermen found a Kannon statue in the Sumida River. Visitors pass the Kaminarimon gate and the Nakamise shopping street to the Hōzōmon gate, the five-storey pagoda and the main hall, rebuilt in 1958 after the 1945 air raids.