Dating websites and apps were big before but are even bigger now, no doubt influenced by the pandemic that made it harder to do the usual things like go to nightclubs, konpa group dates, or even your school campus to hook up with someone.
There are many such apps on the Japanese market: Tapple, with, Dine, Pairs, Omiai, and more.
We're not sure if it's the local market leader based on current user numbers, but Tinder must be the most famous because of its overseas prevalence and the money it spends on advertising (even recruiting Kiko Mizuhara to front its campaign).
Its just gave a big ...
Following its recent interview with pink film softcore porn star Chisa Hasegawa, the awesome Substack blog-newsletter Tokyo Calling has put out another cracker -- and we are very jealous. We don't know how Gianni Simone pulled it off but he managed to land an interview with a genuine soapland worker, and it's a sensitive and enlightening read.
Accompanied by photos by Eric Rechsteiner, the intrepid Simone pays a visit to one of the many soaplands (a kind of bathhouse-style brothel) in Senzoku, the Tokyo area formerly known as Yoshiwara -- the city's most popular and renowned red-light ...
Kinbaku (shibari) rope bondage sensei Steve Osada, formerly known as the photographer Dr D Vice, is the inheritor of the Osada name and tying style (Osada-ryu) from Eikichi Osada.
The late master is one of the people responsible for making kinbaku known in the mainstream. He staged his first kinbaku performance at a ballet school in Asagaya, Tokyo, in 1965, which ushered the previously hidden world of rope bondage into the open. He subsequently moved his performance act to the strip show venue circuit in the late 1970s. In the 1980s, he did many shows with pink movie legend Hiromi Saotome, ...
At Tokyo Kinky, we hope we don't moralize. We like to stay as open as possible, even -- and perhaps especially -- when the tastes do not match our own. And given the kind of content we share, we are hardly qualified to get on a high horse and start preaching to the masses.
As such, it is with a touch of bemusement that we are watching a dispute unfold, first on Twitter and now in the mainstream media.
An article titled "I am not alone -- we are all alone: Using masturbation as an ethnographic method in research on shota subculture in Japan" appeared in the respected academic journal ...
Feti Fes is Japan's top fetish festival. We have attended before and previously posted photo reports that readers seemed to like.
It's the kind of event where every little room, cubbyhole, or booth is dedicated to a whole other fetish. Participants include chika (underground) and gravure idols, ero-cosplayers, fetish service providers, and goods and merchandise retailers.
After postponement due to the pandemic -- obviously, given the nature of the event, it's hardly compatible with social distancing guidelines -- Feti Fes 19 was finally held in April. We were not able to attend but, as we ...
Remember the awesome dinosaur-themed love hotel in Machida, Tokyo, we wrote about last autumn? It looks like it was seriously damaged by fire recently.
On the evening of June 9, flames were seen coming from the roof of the dino-inspired Hotel Artia, making it look even more like a scene from Jurassic Park than it did before. Social media was flooded with pics taken from cars traveling along the nearby expressway.
The cause was reportedly the wooden sauna located on the roof of the hotel.
No injuries or fatalities resulted from the fire. Moreover, no damage to the main structure of the ...
Shibari, the Japanese art of rope bondage, is a sexual subculture, something confined to certain clubs and establishments, right? Wrong.
As one event proved, shibari (also known as kinbaku) is also very visible in the streets of Tokyo.
On May 7, Hajime Kinoko, probably the most successful and well-known shibari rope artist in Japan, created an outdoor installation on the walls of a venue in Cat Street, a shopping street in Harajuku, central Tokyo.
The installation involved him and his team suspending five female models (one of whom was Lisa M, aka Lisa Mizuno) in shibari positions on the ...
It's a well-established trope in porn scenes and sexual fantasies the world over, but we think it's pretty rare to see it in the wild.
A couple fucking up against the window of a hotel room in a tall building looking out over the city or some other spectacular view.
But have you ever actually done it? Or seen people doing it?
Ranchan recently managed to get an amazing picture of such a couple having passionate sex right up against a window -- and, even better, generously posted it on Twitter last week for us all to enjoy (and envy).
The lucky man wears a hotel-style white dressing gown ...
It was surely inevitable.
We all know that used panties is an infamous and genuine fetish in Japan (and elsewhere, of course), whose needs are served by various products sold by major companies as well as individuals hoping to make a quick yen.
Face masks were already a big part of people's lives in Japan even pre-pandemic, especially during flu or pollen allergy seasons. But now they are almost part of our daily uniform and one that is unlikely to go away any time soon.
This has cultivated a new strain of fetish, it seems: used face masks, especially those worn by attractive women.
As ...
Enako is Japan's most famous cosplayer at the moment -- and also most successful.
By 2019, she was making $90,000 a month, a tenfold increase from 2016. She is a spokesperson for anima and game corporations, and also earns yen from streaming. She makes very regular appearances on the covers of weekly magazines, though doesn't charge a modeling fee for these, as we previously reported -- a savvy decision that encourages magazines to keep hiring her.
Success and fame means money. It also means masses of costumes.
In Enako's case, a whole warehouse full of costumes. She has hundreds of them ...
