Friday, June 19, 2009

Shibuya 109


109 (Ichi-maru-kyū) is a department store in Shibuya, Tokyo.The store is operated by the Tokyu Malls Development (TMD), a company under the Tokyu Group.

Shibuya 109 located across the street from Shibuya station, Dogenzaka district of Tokyo's Shibuya Ward, what used to be called Koibumi Yokocho (Love letter lane), the center of fashion for young women in Japan, which opened in April 1979.

This building, which has variety of trendy clothing outlets, has succeeded by targeting women age 15 to 20, and have many new brands stuffs here. The main customer base of Shibuya 109 is girls in their teens who are fans of the popular all-girls group “Morning Musume”. Many popular foreign singers and actresses come here when they are in Japan. Not only foreign singers and actresses, Japanese singers and actresses also come here to shopping, even Japanese top diva, Hamasaki Ayumi, has her own store here.

The architect was Minoru Takeyama. Tokyu, the building's operator, designed the building as a "Fashion Community" containing small retail stores targeting the early-30s female consumer.

The name of the building, 109, is taken from the Japanese characters to (meaning 10) and kyu (9) as in Tokyu. The interior of the building is designed to move shoppers in a loop on each floor from the elevators past various shops. A movie theater was originally planned for the top floor, but the fire department would not grant approval due to emergency-evacuation routes not meeting appropriate standards. Although originally targed at women in their 30s, the building later became more known as a mecca for young women from the gyaru subculture


When it first opened for business, this fashion center aimed at a wide range of customers, from young people to the middle-aged and elderly. Following the collapse of the bubble economy in early 1990s, sales dropped off sharply. In 1995, Shibuya 109 reinvented itself by deciding to cease targeting men and to draw young women instead. The strategy paid off, and Shibuya 109 posted record sales of ¥23.5 billion ($213 million at ¥110 to the dollar) in 2003.

Because this fashion center has been attracting customers from all over Japan, such as middle school and high school girls visiting Tokyo on school trips, Shibuya 109 marked its twenty-fifth anniversary by beginning sales over the Internet.

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