With the 2020 Summer Olympics around the corner and Tokyo in midst of overtourism mayhem, we editors of Néojaponisme (W. David Marx, Ian Lynam, and Matt Treyvaud) and our favorite contributors wrote tens of thousands of words of new content to celebrate the older Tokyo of the Shōwa Era (1926-1989): what lives on (the Toden Arakawa Line), what is at risk of extinction (the kissaten), and what’s been lost forever (the dance hall Furorida).
The B5-size, 128-page issue contains essays, never-before translated short stories and reportage, poems, original drawings, lettering showcases, and graphic design. In concrete terms:
Production is all ready to go, so we’ll hit start with our Japanese printers as soon as the campaign comes to a successful end.
We’ve wanted to make a print issue ever since we started Néojaponisme in 2007, but the timing has never been better. The Internet is a very different place now, and print has become a better fit with our kind of content. We want NJP#1 to be something you buy, read, enjoy, save, pull off the shelf once in a while as a reference. And by virtue of being a physical object with limited distribution, print will deliver our writing to the suitably sized, highly targeted audience we aimed for at the beginning.
But the most important reason is that we will offer a guide to many special places in Tokyo that we don’t want to be sucked into the overtourism vortex. These are tips just for you, dear reader.
Yes… Ian and I have slowly been working on this issue, rather than the website, for about three years with a host of unbelievably patient contributors.
Yes, our stubborn design motif makes even more sense for print. The issue will be printed in Japan in black and a retro Pantone 1788 red, similar to the beni-red used in printing in early Shōwa. (The preview images will look a bit salmon compared to real life.)
For the last 12 years, Néojaponisme has never, ever asked readers for any money or financial contributions. We didn’t even make you look at ads on the website, other than one or two native ads that Ian and I wrote as normal essays about travel, design, and the history of golf for some brands we like. But this time we’d love to have your support on this print issue so we can not only pay the production costs but continue to do more publications like this in the future. Think of a contribution as an investment into more Néojaponisme content into the future.
If we get to ¥750,000, we’ll give everyone these two blank notebooks with Ian’s graphics for free:
Please consider contributing to the campaign. We’re very excited to get this into your hands after many years of work.
A print copy of NJP#1 will go for $20 / ¥2200 retail (without shipping), so if you buy now, you get to make sure the project happens and can get the issue at a slight discount once you consider the shipping is free.
Thank you as always,
W. David Marx and Ian Lynam, Co-Founders of Néojaponisme
We decided to only put this up on Kickstarter after we had finished full production / design, so the only thing we need now is to add supporters’ names to the issue and we can tell the printers “Go!”