For almost as long as we have been involved with the adult industry in Japan, since the late 2000s, two big names have always dominated: Tenga, revered for its innovation and sophistication with masturbation toys; and Orient Industry, which has almost single-handedly made Japanese sex dolls internationally famous.
The maker of customized, premium silicone sex dolls has become legendary, its hyper-realistic products have featured in books and documentaries, and are admired by all. If you have never seen an Orient Industry doll in person, be assured that photos don't do them justice.
This ...
We love taking a trip not so much down memory lane as Japanese sex history lane, back to the early days of hair nudes (full-frontal shoots) and classic porn from the Showa era.
We previously took a nostalgic look at Japanese gravure idols from the 1970s and '80s that included the comely Nami Asada (麻田奈美).
Nami Asada made a real stir in the 1970s with her nude photo shoots that showcased her stunning F-cup breasts to the full.
The "apple nudes," where she used an apple prop to cover her most intimate parts, first appeared in 1973 in several issues of Heibon Punch magazine. They were ...
Have you always wanted to own a love hotel?
Now you can! And for just ¥88 million (a bit less than an average newly built condo in Tokyo costs).
The two-floor hotel, which is located a short distance from the beach and an hour's walk from Atami Station, is currently for sale.
The building is 728.65 square meters (the land is a bit bigger, at 999.46 square meters), and was built in 1985, which would make it positively ancient in Tokyo but not too shabby in a regional place like Atami.
Best of all, it is designed like a castle (perhaps in a Middle Eastern or Mediterranean ...
Before we had streaming and downloadable formats, we had Blu-ray and DVD. And before that, back in some period lost to the mists of time -- namely, the 1980s and 1990s -- we have VHS video tapes.
The arrival of VHS marked the full birth of the Japanese adult video industry, hence the name.
The new format had incredible commercial potential for widespread distribution of content and meant hardcore porn was no longer a niche but an easily accessible, widely consumed form of porn (as opposed to the simulated sex in "pink" sexploitation, whose decline was hastened by AV).
VHS was the heyday of ...
We've written before about Yunana, the young female fan of postwar Showa-era love hotels who posts photos of her outings (alone) to these bygone dens of romance and sex.
It seems Yunana's following has continued to grow, since she has just released a book showcasing her work.
The book's title, In Search of the Revolving Bed, is a reference to perhaps the most famous love hotel room gimmick that is actually quite a rarity (it became illegal to install new ones after the law changed in 1985).
Now aged 26, the love hotel enthusiast was recently interviewed by Bunshun about her activities, ...
Japanese capsule toys are a cornucopia of choice and variety. There seems to be no end to the objects that pop out from the thousands of vending machines found at stores, train stations, and tourist destinations.
What's still often surprising, though, are the eyebrow-raising subject matters of certain toys.
Last year, for instance, we reported on the miniature vibrator capsule toys.
Slightly less risqué but just as awesome are these love hotel-inspired capsule toys. For a mere ¥300, you can get your own love hotel room key.
We have yet to spot these in the wild -- might we find the ...
Back in May, we reported on the arrests of the head of Japanese secondhand book store chain Mandarake and four of its employees over the sale of sexually explicit old photo books, which the chain apparently sold online and at two of its stores.
Though "hair nude" photo books with full-frontal nudity have been produced and sold by mainstream publishers for decades, the books in question here were so-called "vinyl books," which are older and more obscure -- and less regulated. They constitute a kind of gray zone in terms of adult publications in Japan: hair nude books are "celebrity books" or ...
Readers, we have failed you. After reporting on Mariya Nagao's latest photo book in December 2021, we failed to follow up when it was released earlier this year.
We should have, because it was actually (as rumored) Mariya Nagao's first nude photo book. Her fourth print book Yabai! Mariya. came out in January and follows Mariyagi as she visits an old hot spring resort with its run-down love hotels and snack bars.
The Showa-themed shoot features a naked Mariya in vintage clothes that she takes off for a bath and then enjoys the water. Her nude butt is visible in several shots. After years of ...
Maki Makie (マキエマキ) has been working since the early 1990s as a freelance commercial photographer.
Now aged 56, she gained a whole new following when she began taking self-portraits in 2015 and repositioning herself as a "selfie jukujo" (自撮り熟女) model.
This fame has had some unexpected consequences, as she revealed in a long interview with Bunshun.
Her self-portraits revel in a Showa-era atmosphere. Often shot in sketchy or remote locations (like old, rundown resorts or empty shopping streets), they mix humor with the erotic. She is currently exhibiting her work in ...
People have arrested the CEO of famous Japanese secondhand book store chain Mandarake as well as four employees in connection with the sale of obscene material.
Best known for manga but also offering collectibles, doujinshi, and anime toys, Mandarake was selling so-called "vinyl books," a term referring to pornographic photo books from the 1970s and 1980s that showed genitalia. (The "vinyl" part means the plastic that was used to cover the books.)
As regular readers will know, Japan's strange obscenity laws mean it is nominally illegal to show actual genitalia, hence adult video is ...
