Genre: Architecture
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Stormclouds over Aomori
As I mentioned in the previous post, Aomori Prefecture is the northernmost prefecture on Japan’s main island of Honshu. The city of Aomori itself averages 26 feet of snow annually, more than any city in the world. I visited in November, and December–February turned out to be one of the snowiest in decades. It would
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Torii! Torii! Torii!
Takayama Inari Shrine, and its senbon torii (thousand torii), are decidedly not easy to get to without a car: three buses, a long walk, and about two-and-a-half hours later we were exploring the grounds. The “thousand” torii is symbolic, rounded up from the just over 200 torii that are actually there. Regardless, they are striking
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Inohana Castle
Chiba City, Chiba, Japan. October 2025.
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Chambered
Morioka, Iwate, Japan. November 2025.
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Checkered
Taito City, Tokyo, Japan. October 2025.
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Pattern of Abuse
Sumida, Tokyo, Japan. October 2025.
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End of the Road
Shinjuku City, Tokyo, Japan. October 2025.
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Golden Turd
It didn’t take long for my daughter and I to notice the weird giant yellow thing across the river near our hotel in Asakusa. “What is that?” I asked. She looked on her phone for a minute and then laughed. “Oh,” she said, “it’s the ‘Asahi Flame’, but the locals call it ‘The Golden Turd’”.
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Sumida Reflections
Back in Tokyo after spending the day down in Kamakura (discussed in this post) I had nothing on my agenda for the evening, so I went for a walk along the Sumida River. I mostly used my fast 85mm, in part because it had a deep lens hood and it was raining. Besides that handy









