Ginza

What to see

Start at the Ginza 4-chome crossing, where the Wako clock tower and the department stores face each other, and walk Chuo-dori south to Ginza Six. The building holds around 240 shops over thirteen floors and six basements, but the reason you'd go in is the free roof garden, a quiet deck above the traffic that most shoppers never find. Back on Chuo-dori to the north, Itoya Ginza rises twelve floors under its red paperclip sign, one obsession per floor, from letter paper to travel gear and craft paper. The serious fountain pen counter is in the K.Itoya annex on the street behind.

Kabukiza Theatre is the other anchor, on Showa-dori at Higashi-Ginza. Kengo Kuma's 2013 rebuild kept the grand Momoyama-style facade and set a tower behind it. The single-act hitomakumi tickets for the fourth-floor gallery let you see one act instead of a full programme. Rent the English subtitle guide. On a weekend afternoon, walk the whole of Chuo-dori during the pedestrian hours, when the district reads as one long promenade. The Tsukiji Outer Market is less than ten minutes' walk south-east of Kabukiza, so it's the natural start to a Ginza morning.

Where to eat and drink

Ginza's great meals happen at counters, and you'll need to book them. Tempura Kondo, on the ninth floor of an ordinary Ginza building, has fried at a single counter since 1991, and chef Fumio Kondo's vegetables, above all the inch-thick sweet potato, are the reason to reserve weeks ahead. Lunch courses cost far less than dinner for the same frying. If you haven't booked anything, Kissa You sits directly behind Kabukiza and serves an omurice with an almost liquid omelette over ketchup rice. The queue peaks between the matinee and evening performances, so come at opening or in the mid-afternoon lull.

Coffee is a Ginza institution. Cafe de l'Ambre has poured coffee and nothing else since 1948, from more than thirty single origins, some aged for over a decade. The Blanc et Noir, a sweetened iced coffee served like a cocktail, is the order on a warm afternoon. Bring cash. The basement food halls of Ginza Six and the Chuo-dori department stores are the best grazing in the district. In the evening, Bar High Five is the benchmark for Japanese cocktail bartending. There's no menu. Hidetsugu Ueno asks a few questions and builds a drink to suit, and you'll want to reserve ahead. For a louder, cheaper last round, the yakitori joints under the train tracks at Yurakucho are five minutes north.

Where to stay

Ginza is an expensive base, and it suits a particular kind of trip. Business in the district, dinner at the counters as the point of the visit, or a short stay before an early flight. Stock runs from international luxury and design hotels around Chuo-dori to compact business hotels in the side streets toward Higashi-Ginza and Shimbashi, where rooms shrink and prices ease. The Asakusa Line at Higashi-Ginza runs through trains to Haneda Airport, a real advantage on departure day. The streets go quiet by ten at night. If it's your first visit and you want life on the doorstep, you'll do better on Shinjuku's west side and treat Ginza as a day out.

How to do it in a day

Start at the Tsukiji Outer Market for a grazing breakfast, then walk to Kabukiza, check the day's single-act schedule and buy a ticket for an afternoon act. Spend the late morning on Chuo-dori, first Itoya Ginza for paper and pens, then Ginza Six for the basement food hall and the roof garden. If it's a weekend, the street closes to traffic at noon, and walking down the middle of it is the point. See your act of kabuki, then take a late lunch of omurice at Kissa You in the mid-afternoon lull. Recover over an aged coffee at Cafe de l'Ambre as the light goes. Finish with dinner at a reserved counter, or an early booking at Bar High Five and then yakitori under the tracks at Yurakucho.