Tokyo Station

Eight reliefs of zodiac animals sit in the corners of the restored domes, each placed at the compass point it stands for. Four are missing: the rat for north, the rabbit for east, the horse for south and the rooster for west. The domes are octagonal, so only the eight diagonal directions had a corner to put an animal in.

💡 Both the north and south domes have them. You do not need a ticket — the domes are outside the gates, above the Marunouchi north and south exits.

The station's meeting point, hung on 10 June 1968. A station supervisor named Sekiguchi Yonosuke suggested a large shrine bell, because bells have always been used to call people and catch attention. Staff made the first one themselves out of bamboo, washi paper and silver foil, about 70cm across. The one hanging now is the fourth, put up in October 2007 when the Gransta shopping floor opened.

💡 It is inside the gates, on the basement floor. If you are not travelling you cannot reach it without a platform ticket.

On 4 November 1921 Hara Takashi was stabbed near the ticket gates at what is now the Marunouchi south exit. On 14 November 1930 Hamaguchi Osachi was shot on platform 4; he died of the wounds the following year. Plaques mark both spots, set into the floor where people walk past them all day.

💡 The Hara plaque is outside the gates and anyone can see it. The Hamaguchi one is on the platform, by the central staircase, so you need a ticket.

A roof garden of about 1,500 square metres on the sixth floor of KITTE, the building across from the Marunouchi south exit. It opened with the building in March 2013. From the edge you look down on the brick station roof and straight along the platforms.

💡 Free, and open until 23:00 on weekdays and 22:00 at weekends and holidays. The station is lit until 21:00, so the hour before that is the one to aim for.

A terrace on the restaurant floor, open to about 180 degrees on the station side. You can walk out and sit at a table without ordering anything. It faces the brick facade head on, at about the height of the roof.

💡 Open until 23:00, and the station is lit until 21:00. There are chairs and tables, which the KITTE roof does not have.

A museum opened in 1988 inside the station building itself, by the Marunouchi north exit. The restoration left the original structure exposed where it could, so the gallery walls are bare brick and steel from 1914. The building around them is an Important Cultural Property.

💡 The exhibitions change, but the walls are the reason to go in. The staircase down from the top floor runs along the inside of the dome.

The street that runs parallel to the tracks on the palace side, about 1.2km of it, lined with roughly 250 street trees. Cars are kept out for part of the day and tables come out onto the pavement. It is the one place in this district that is built for walking rather than for getting somewhere.

💡 From mid-November to mid-February the trees are lit in champagne gold. It is also the quietest part of Marunouchi at the weekend, when the office towers empty out.