The World Kaikan in Nakano

Conventional reasoning dictates that a building cannot qualify as abandoned if it still has inhabitants. After gazing up at the towering mess that is the World Kaikan, however, I’m no longer sure that such logic applies.



For over half a century, the World Kaikan has loomed over the back streets of Nakano, a five story edifice of decayed mystery whose very secrets have been eaten by the worms of time. Abandoned neon signs litter the grounds like the toppled gravestones of businesses that failed long ago. The front entrance is flanked by mounds of ripe garbage to the left and the fossilized remains of abandoned bikes to the right. Mutant cats dart through the rusted underbrush as if spying for their necromantic masters who stir within the crypt.


Hino Hideshi's pet cat.

Even vagrants know better than to stay out of its unsettling underground. The stairs are left unguarded for those with enough gall to brave the musty basement. Down here, door frames grow organically from the wall like fungus, derelict bars remain suspiciously intact, and a phantasmal old woman purportedly stalks the bathroom. The lights illuminate the sickly checkerboard pattern on the floor, which terminates at the mouth of a hallway swallowed by the darkness.



FUN FACTS ABOUT THE WORLD KAIKAN

1) Urban legend has it that the building was a hotel in its past life, a theory given credence by the piles of rotting furniture that line the stairs. Rusted box springs poke their heads through the debris like the first flower after a nuclear winter.


This ancient unicycle is one of the building's more benign mysteries.

2) The remaining pubs and watering holes evolved to survive the harsh conditions surrounding the building. Darwin would be delighted by Vow, a bar run by an ordained monk (Jodo Shinshu, if you're keeping track,) where you can imbibe in a sutra-specific cocktail while ingesting the words of the Buddha.



There is also Dio, the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure themed bar. If you need an explanation as to what Dio is doing at The World Kaikan, then navigating the Stance-themed menu would be muda muda!

3) Kuroki Kaoru, 80's porn starlet famous for her au naturel underarms and no-nonsense public persona, attempted suicide in 1994 after ditching director and collaborator Toru Muranishi when the bum refused to pay out her fair share of the profits. She survived the plunge from a building that is only described as "a hotel in Nakano."


Considering that a person could survive a five-story fall, and coupled with eyewitness reports of a burnt-out Kuroki wandering the halls of Broadway like a reject from The Ring, it stands to reason that The World Kaikan could have been the very building that she threw herself from.

4) The previous building owner ran away overnight with his family back to Taiwan, their room on the top floor untouched since. Rumors would have you believe that the yakuza got to him first, and that his rotting skeleton now inhabits the broken elevator. The only legitimate residents these days are Korean exchange students living in a makeshift dorm converted from the hotel rooms on the top floor.



Shinjuku has Golden Street, its shanty town of old-timey bars thick with the ambiance of the good ‘ol days of post-war poverty and the national zeitgeist fueling Japan’s rise to the top. The Nakano equivalent could be called Bronze Street—Tarnished, third-rate, yet beautifully compelling in its decay. The World Kaikan stands as the frayed banner that other ramshackle buildings rally under. Around it you can find storefronts whose broken windows are mended by crumbling movie fliers and whose doorsteps echo with the footfalls of more vibrant times.



The old hands who remain have seen Nakano's rise as the country's busiest shopping center to it's fall at the hands of subsequent stylish, youth-oriented districts. Yet the World Kaikan still maintains watchful vigilance as a reminder of a time when consumerism meshed seamlessly with the community. Broadway itself is a living museum, and it's curators call these rusted streets home, with all roads running to the World Kaikan.

My Posse's on Broadway: Recomints SIDE B

Since its inception 23 years ago, the Recomints group has made it their mission to bring offbeat music and movies to the public eye. From videocassettes to laser disks to DVDs, Recomints Side-B has always supported underground directors and foreign filmmakers.

Looking to get your hands on Roman Porno and Toei yakuza flicks that haven’t yet been released internationally? They carry every notable exploitation flick from the 60’s, 70’s and beyond.

Recomints SIDE-B's recommended directors:

Matsue Tetsuaki

Born to Korean parents, Matsue’s Zainichi upbringing gives him a unique pair of cultural eyes to peer through the camera with. Borrowing a page from self-made porn star Company Matsuo's playbook, his man-off-the-street style documentaries have taken him to the top of the independent circuit as the director to keep watch on.


Annyeong Yumika, his most recent foray into playful lewdness, chronicles his journey to Korea to track down the true story of Hayashi Yumika, a porn starlet who appeared in over 180 films during her 16 year career (one of them a rumored Korean skin flick) before passing away under mysterious circumstances at the age of 35.

Wakamtsu Koji

A virtuoso of the flesh, this reformed Yakuza’s anarchist films made him no shortage of enemies both domestically and abroad in Russia and Germany. He transformed Pink Films into a soapbox for the revolution with Ecstasy of the Angels and others.


After walking away from commercial films when the censors burst the bawdy bubble in the mid 80’s, he has since resurfaced with an award winning expose on the fall of the Japanese United Red Army and his take on the Edogawa Ranpo classic, Caterpillar.

My Posse's on Broadway: History

If you've found our blog, chances are you don't need someone convincing you that Nakano Broadway is one of the greatest pieces of post-war architecture in Japan. It is a luxury that has become a necessity. Yet even the most stalwart shoppers are unaware of its true nature. The concrete walls hide a living, breathing organism with a forty-year history of revolution and storefronts that come and go like mirages. This post is the first in an ongoing series exploring the lore, individual shops, and new ways to appreciate Nakano Broadway.

Why Nakano Broadway?

The media has lied to you. Shibuya, Harajuku, and Akihabara are not the pinnacles of pop culture that the Ministry of Tourism would have you believe. These places represent merely the tip of the great pyramid they draw inspiration from, whose true riches are buried deep and far away from the international eye. Nakano Broadway is the one true bastion of authenticity, where consumers are in complete control of the trends and brand image.

A time capsule of collectibles from past and present loaded with out of print manga, forgotten toys, limited-edition soft vinyl, vintage film memorabilia, antiques, and record stores catering to your every taste, Nakano Broadway has everything you never knew you wanted under one roof. The four-story shopping center is held together by years of history, and its adjoining rooftop apartments have been home to influential celebrities and politicians. Forget everything you know—Nakano Broadway is it’s own world, a glass-bottle boat floating in the sands of time.

The History of Nakano Broadway

Miyata Keisaburo, founder of Nakano Broadway, dreamed of marrying consumer space with living space. Originally a dentist, Miyata’s studies took him abroad to seminars in America where he discovered architecture that combined shopping malls and high-class homes. He took this American dream back to Japan, and over the next few years constructed a series of designer apartments, including Harajuku Co-Op Olympia, Shibuya Co-Op, and others. The crown jewel of his career was Nakano Broadway, though it wasn’t long before his prized treasure was stolen away from him.

Nakano Broadway opened in 1966 as the Roppongi Hills of its time. This blue-blood image was pruned by the startup investors of Tokyo Coup. While the group were capable marketers, they were inept landlords, and the combination of low occupancy due to high rent, favors cut for preferred residents (including Miyata himself), and an overall mismanagement of profits kept their books in the red over the initial eight years. When Miyata was eventually booted from the board of directors, it sparked a bloodless coup d’etat in which store owners and residents bought Broadway back from the corporate suits.

This revolution liberated store owners. Now everyone is free to run any kind of operation they want, so long as they have the cash and are operating within the law. Over the years the building has seen a DIY medical clinic, a butcher specializing in snake meat, a no-panty café, and a second-hand store dealing exclusively in items left behind on trains. In this buyer’s market, it’s anyone’s guess as to what stores will remain standing until your next visit.

The segmented nature of the building’s culture guarantees you’ll find something that scratches your itch, or at the very least leaves you with a rash in unexpected places. Have a Polaroid of your aura analyzed by professional auraologists. Take the foot-high ice cream challenge. Explore the building’s Escher-like architecture. And prepare to lose yourself in the endless halls where lives are spent, found, and remembered.

Little Picassos

Nothing to brighten up a lazy Sunday visit to Nakano Broadway like artwork by local children! Their work lining the walls along the stairwells is free and better than 99% of what you'll find at real "art" galleries. Follow me on a wild adventure into the mind of a child.

Look at those razor-sharp chompers on this kid's family! Being raised by cannibals has covered the boy's world with a veneer of human skin so that even eyeballs look like juicy, fleshy treats.

I'd be happy too if I had a pet dinosaur that shat rainbows.

Children often call out for help in the most unexpected of ways, and this painting is a poignant example. I hope her family reacts positively to her lycanthropy and provides her with the care she needs.

If autobiographical works like Basket Case have taught us anything, its that monster babies are nothing but trouble. But if they were born into a family of mutant freaks? Problem solved! Just don't you discriminate against them, lest you become a monster yourself.

Here the artist uses physical metamorphosis as a metaphor for one man's descent into madness. The progressive shrinking represent his dwindling sanity, and balding is used as a motif to show the passage of time. Brilliant!

Where do these scamps get their crazy ideas from? Not being old enough to have their creative spark be ground into the dirt by society is a big part of it. Lack of parental censorship is another. In a childhood with goose-stepping Monchichis, anything goes.

	Click here for more mayhem!
Little Picassos

I No Need A Heno Tsuppari!

I don't know what that title means, but either way that's an awesomely bad photoshop!

A routine visit to Nakano Broadway's Microkan led to a fated meeting of Men! In the pic with us is no other than Mr. Akira Kushida! If you just asked yourself "Who's that?", brace for impact- you are about to be piledrived into Manhood!


Kinnikuman Go Fight!


Honou No Kinnikuman


Space Sheriff Gavan