The Tokyo Station Hotel first opened in 1915. Since 2007, though, as many visitors to the Marunouchi area will have noticed, a major preservation and restoration project has been underway, aiming to restore the Tokyo Station Marunouchi building to its former glory.
The beautiful red brick facade is being renewed with care and will provide a deserved “new” landmark for Tokyo Station and the city as a whole. Additions to the building seem tasteful but the real stars are the three large domes, two of which, on the north and south, were destroyed by Allied bombing in May 1945. The red bricks are more familiar to Europeans than those of us in Japan.
The interior, too, looks to the past for its design. East Japan Railway Co., which owns the building, found original documents inside the building and builders are following the designs to reproduce the reliefs of Chinese Zodiac animals and eagles that adorned the walls–it’ll be worth a stay just to get a peek inside!
Tsunami-hit Miyagi prefecture has received a welcome boost, with most of the slate used for the roofing produced in the prefecture. After the 2011 disaster, a company based in Ishinomaki and Tome salvaged the slate from their warehouse – some of it had been washed away – and found that it was, luckily, still in good condition. The slate will provide a perfect final touch to the new Tokyo Station Building.
Opening this October, The Tokyo Station Hotel began taking reservations on May 8th and has an English website in development. Weekender is looking forward to the October 3, when the doors will finally open. The Tokyo Station Hotel is currently making preparations for a grand opening event and says it will begin “a new chapter as a unique establishment with advanced facilities, the refined class of an Important Cultural Property, and nearly 100 years of history.”
The first grand-openning of The Tokyo Station Hotel was in 1915
