04.22.2010

Shibuya crosswalk, Tokyo

Just one stop from Harajuku, less than a kilometre down a gentle hill, so if youre not carrying too much shopping, its an easy walk, just follow the train line south. If you see Tower Records you’re heading in the right direction.

Coming by train to Shibuya, which lets face it, is one of those Tokyo “musts”, you get to witnessed one of the world’s busiest stations in full stride. But don’t let photos from above fool you, while yes it is busy ALL the time, once you’re in the midst of it, its no different than any other major train station round the world, even if its comparative to Grand Central, Paddington or Guangzhou Rail. Likewise for when you step out of the station and into the infamous Shibuya crosswalk aka Tokyo’s Time Square. From above it looks like ants before a storm but in reality its no different than jaywalking cross Adelaide and Edward streets in Brisbane (though if you’re going to jaywalk here, do so at your own peril!). Just get to the front before the walk signal goes then skew off on the road of the direction you want to go, sorted. A bit of extra pep in your step to keep ahead of the surging masses doesn’t go astray either.

Shibuya, Tokyo

Shibuya could very well be Japanese for department store since the place is littered with them. Shibuya 109 (buildings 1, 2 and 3), Parco (buildings 1 and 2), Tokyu and OIOI Marui City are the notable mentions, though the whole “suburb” is pretty much one department store with a huge variety of stores.

Some of our faves were Bic camera their website says it all, electronics galore, one of the more well known stores with English speaking staff on hand; the Disney store with its Alice in Wonderland staircase and across the road is the 500th KFC (has a plaque n all :p ).

Sneaker-wise there’s another Adidas store, the usual scattering of ABC mart’s and THE KiksTYO, not a large range of sneakers but a few rarer models and of course their famed apparel and tees. There are also a few smaller independent sneaker stores near Parco (and a TGI Fridays 😉 ).

How do you know you bought a genuine KiksTYO tee? It comes in a box 😉

For toys you’ll want to try and find Mandarake. The building isn’t very well signed but it is called BEAM, head up 3-4 blocks on the main street from the Shibuya cross walk in a north west direction and you should stumble on it. Depending on the direction you come from you might catch a glimpse of the “BEAM” on a cyclinder structure on a corner. Its in the same building as RECOfan if that helps!

Mandarake is def. targeted to an older market, mainly because of the vintage collectibles. Wall to wall glass cabinets housing vinyls and figures that either were clearly someone’s fave childhood toy or the yellowing plastic of a original sealed toy from a child with some serious self control, all sporting hefty price tags to match. On the plus side, since they do deal with a lot of used items, you can pick up current stock at a fraction of the price, if the box has been opened. Most are still in mint condition and have all their parts. There are also shelves and bins of bits and pieces and clearance items for those that don’t mind a rummage.

I walked out with a bunch of Revoltech figures, a model kit Space Cruiser Yamato aka Starblazers (one of my childhood favourites!) and of course the obligatory Transformer (and random Gashapon :p).

As mentioned RECOfan is in the same building, one of the larger music stores that also do used items and records. Roughly about 5 times the size of Rockinghorse Records in Brisbane you could easily spend a day crate digging. Good thing is the sections are well labelled in English and are alphabetically broken down into genre and artist with a fair serving of rarities and country only releases. If you don’t get your fill here, there’s also Disk Union and “Dance music records” stores with a block or so.

For some sightseeing novelty check out “Love hotel hill”, basically a small lane dedicated to the oldest profession in the world. Good for a laugh or a quickie.

If you’re hanging around into the evening and want to get your boogie on then Shibuya is also home to Womb one of Tokyo’s biggest nightclubs with matching exuberant entry fee and drink prices. Check the “Womb cruise” party in May 2010 on a boat that looks like its come straight out of the Thunderbirds!

Tokyo part #1 – Ueno for a day
Tokyo part #2 – Getting round Tokyo, Ueno Sakura at night
Tokyo part #3 – Harajuku
Tokyo part #5 – Kichijoji and Shinjuku
Tokyo part #6 – Akihabara
Tokyo part #7 – Odaiba and Leaving Tokyo

Photo Gallery Here

12.12.2009


With the call of Xmas and all the consumerism, especially of the moulded plastic kind, that it has to offer, we thought we’d give tribute to the little things that some how make us smile no matter what (:

Here are some of ours Gallery here

munny… then you get the rest of the family!

Kidrobot has a reunion for Munny with a family they never knew they had! Now under the aptly titled Munny world, Munny gets 4 new buddies Trikky, Rooz, Buband Raffy in the DIY range. All figures sit around the 4″ mark in size, are only available in white and retail for the same $9.95US as the Munnys. The possibilities are endless!

We’ll definitely be grabbing a couple soon enough 😀 If you can’t wait for them to hit the Aussie shelves and are willing to foot the postage costs, you can grab them from the site here

Get customising!

11.24.2009

Nuked Nooks

by admin

Kid BurnerA few months ago we stumbled across what can only be described as blatant ripoffs of Kidrobot Munnys. They’re called Nooks. The basic body mould and arms are pretty close (except they’re made from a cheap soft pvc blend. The arms are even softer along the lines of a dog’s chew toy, but more on that later) to that of the Munnys while the heads are an oblong sphere skewed towards the front. The main difference lies in the different styles of characters. Each one is a different “thing”, ranging from standard animals: mouse, cow, kangaroo to mythical creatures like a dragon or a Cyclops guy with a bolt through its head or people like nurses and kings. So each character has a different add on to the basic mould be it wings, tails, horns or ears along with a terrible attempt at personalising with a name, favourite game, “friend” and a rego number to take to the seizure inducing Teletubby designed website. What it is for, I can’t tell you, but as soon as I get a hold of a 5yo, I’ll let you know.

Despising aside, I thought, these could actually come in handy. Instead of spending $20-30AU to purchase a 4″ DIY Munny locally that I could potentially ruin, I can pay half that and practice on the cheapy instead. So in doing that I’ve created a little how to for those wanting to get their art on and letting a bit of creativity run wild.

The first thing I tried was a simple coat of paint to get rid of the ugly faces and colours. As mentioned theyre made from a soft pvc type plastic which causes some problems with adhesion and drying. If you apply very light coats (I used a cheap enamel spray paint) allowing drying time between each coat, the body and head seems to dry ok, however if you get it even slightly thicker in places, it will have a tacky texture. As for the arms, forget about it. They stay just as wet as the day you sprayed them. So you will need a pvc specific type paint (I’m still trying to track down the best type for the job) for it to dry and adhere properly. Not having this handy at the time I instead decoupaged it in plain paper and then repainted it.

The other option of course is decoupage from the start, basically covering the whole thing in small bits of paper with glue, paper Mache style, and this is what we’ve done. I will detail the process I used in a future post.

Till then, a sneak peak of one I whipped up. In tribute to the Kid Robot knock offs I’m aptly naming them Kid Burners (:

DSC_2537-4 copy

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