His other loves are football and food. having just wrapped up the men's World Cup, I figured we had had enough football and focused on food and books.
My goal was to fill the two days with as much of each as possible...
He has also seen an art exhibit in Harajuku he fancied going to and in a previous conversation talked about going to the big Maruzen book store in Tokyo.
He had been asked to participate in something run at a university in the morning, so we met up in at Tokyo station, had lunch then hit the book store. I left him to it and headed to the 4th floor which is all English/foreign language books and stationery.
Once we had our fill and bought some books we headed up to Jimbocho, which is otherwise known as book town. We have visited here before, its nice to have a mooch around, there are some lovely shops but its not really a foreign tourist destination unless you read Japanese.
The Book Hotel is close to the metro exit and if you need supplies, there are 3 conbinis a few minutes walk away to choose from.
In the lobby there are sofas and walls of books, the check-in was quick and easy, the staff were lovely. You need a hotel room key to use the lift which is a safety feature I approve of.
We had picked the white manga room and well... it was all white and filled with manga of all descriptions. The light from behind the bookcase at the bottom left is one of the bed nooks, also has manga in there and lights and plugs so you can recharge your phone etc.
There are plenty of amenities, green tea and coffee, kettle fridge and manga, did I mention the manga yet! They are pretty much all in Japanese, we found two English language ones. My husband had booked the room and there was some confusion (not the hotels fault) about the beds so we ended up with an extra bed in the room, which is what you can see in the bottom right. I don't think the room s designed for a long stay, more over night for maybe a night or two.
One thing visitors to Japan might not know, if yo look at the left side of the photo below, there is a line marked on the floor, this is where you take your shoes off, leave them on the side of the door. The black things you can see on the room side are the slippers provided by the hotel. This is common practice in Japanese hotels. If there is no physical line, just leave your shoes as close to the door as possible and change into the supplied slippers.
Up in the loft there was another double bed and yes, more manga. Ebi-kun bagged this bed, I ended up in the nook and hubby on the third bed. We all slept well!
Unusually for a Japanese hotel, there was no bath tub but instead a sauna and shower! Not that we needed it considering the weather in the middle of the summer in Japan, lol. It was nice to have though, maybe we will visit in the winter next time!
There were plenty of towels, night wear, bathrobes and toothbrushes etc.
One of the little extra touches that I loved was the manga welcome guide, explaining what you can and can't do. They ask that you return the manga to the place you picked it up from, I think it was organised in someway but not sure how.
Usually when we go to stay somewhere, the hotel is really just somewhere to sleep but this place forced us to slow down and spend time inside (the air-conditioned) room and actually chill and relax.
We did go out in the evening to eat and visit a bookish speakeasy - more on that soon. And I picked up pastries for breakfast, the hotel doesn't do food. The check out is 11am too so we had a lovely relaxing start to the day.
What do you think? Would you like to stay in a book hotel? Let me know below, or if you have stayed in one and have recommendations, we'd be up for trying more places!
To make a reservation of find out more, you can check out The Book Hotel here.
