Until now, Kabukicho had a reputation for being home to the bulk of the city’s host clubs and love hotels, not to mention Shinjuku’s giant Godzilla statue, yet with the opening of #000T – a shop selling only plain black T-shirts – and its neighbours, the rough-around-the-edges nightlife district now has a slightly different flavour.
Takuya Natsume’s latest monochrome fashion boutique can be exciting or bemusing depending on your particular style. The store’s clothing racks look like they belong in the closet of a film character, but this all-black T-shirt shop is now becoming a trendsetter in its own neighbourhood.
Next to #000T is a bar, Ikkoku, and an experimental art gallery, Decameron. The bar and gallery are a new version of the no-talking Decameron bar in Kabukicho, which grabbed headlines last year for asking patrons to jot their drink orders on a notepad and show it to the bartender to be served.
Decameron takes its name and inspiration from the anthology of Italian novellas by Giovanni Boccaccio, and the gallery will feature small-scale exhibitions based on the themes of ethics and morality, where visitors will be able to ask the artists questions about their works. Ikkoku specialises in craft gin and whisky cocktails, with new concoctions created specially for each exhibition at the gallery.
Between the single-colour T-shirt store and the eclectic gallery space, the complex certainly classifies as niche, and yet there's something here for everyone. It's the sort of place that makes you feel like you're earning street cred just by being there, and with installations and cocktail menus changing so frequently, you want to check back in often.
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