Totoro, Tokyo, and Traces of Summer

Shiro-Hige’s Cream Puff Factory is a short walk away

After three weeks of traveling across Japan, I’ve now settled in Sangenjaya — a leafy pocket of Tokyo that feels both lived-in and slightly forgotten, in the best way. I’ll be working remotely from here for the rest of July, moving a little slower in the heat and letting the days stretch wide.

In the early mornings and soft evenings, I wander through backstreets with my camera, practicing the art of seeing again — the silence of a narrow alley, wilting hydrangeas, the round gaze of a Totoro cream puff.

This is shōkakkō.
Not something sought, but something that finds you when you become still.

There is movement, too, beneath this stillness.

🌿 shōkakkō updates:
The team and I are preparing to launch two new meaningful online experiences in August:

• The Art and Science of Savouring — for those who want to linger longer in life’s good moments.

• (Re)Discover Your shōkakkō — an invitation to trace the small joys already all around you.

A quiet idea has also taken root:
To create a recurring space where people may return — not to perform, but simply to be.
To sit among others, and still be alone with their breath, their pen, their self.

And in Kyoto — in the north part of the city, where the streets are narrow and the roofs are low — an old house awaits us. If the ink dries smoothly on the final papers, we’ll receive its keys before the close of this month.

Summer continues.
The cream puffs soften.
And I, too, soften with them.

— Lolo