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Shinjuku

Special ward in Kantō, Japan

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Since the end of World War II, Shinjuku has become a major secondary center of Tokyo (fukutoshin), rivaling the original city center in Marunouchi. Today, it is a major commercial and administrative center and houses the northern half of Shinjuku Station, the busiest railway station in the world, as well as the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, the administrative center of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.

As of 2025, the ward has an estimated population of 355,981, living in a total area of 18.23 km2.

History

In 1634, during the Edo period, as the outer moat of the Edo Castle was built, a number of temples and shrines moved to the Yotsuya area on the western edge of Shinjuku. In 1698, Naitō-Shinjuku had developed as a new (shin) station (shuku or juku) on the Kōshū Kaidō, one of the major highways of that era. Naitō was the family name of a daimyō whose mansion stood in the area; his land is now a public park, the Shinjuku Gyoen. In 1898, the Yodobashi Water Purification Plant, the city's first modern water treatment facility, was built in the area that is now between the park and the train station.

In 1920, the town of Naitō-Shinjuku, which comprised large parts of present-day Shinjuku (the neighborhood, not the municipality), parts of Nishi-Shinjuku and Kabukichō were integrated into Tokyo City. Shinjuku began to develop into its current form after the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923, since the seismically stable area largely escaped the devastation. Consequently, West Shinjuku is one of the few areas in Tokyo with many skyscrapers.

The Tokyo air raids from May to August 1945 destroyed almost 90% of the buildings in the area in and around Shinjuku Station. The pre-war form of Shinjuku and the rest of Tokyo was retained after the war because the roads and rails, damaged as they were, remained, and these formed the heart of Shinjuku in the post-war construction. Only in Kabuki-cho was a grand reconstruction plan put into action.

The present ward was established on March 15, 1947 with the merger of the former wards of Yotsuya, Ushigome, and Yodobashi. It served as part of the athletics 50 km walk and marathon course during the 1964 Summer Olympics. In March 1965, the Yodobashi Water Purification Plant closed and was replaced by skyscrapers in the following years.

The Sixties in Shinjuku

Shinjuku was the epicenter of new ideas and artistic avant-gardes in Tokyo in the 1960s, much like Greenwich Village in New York.

Cinema

The young directors of the Japanese New Wave used Shinjuku as the setting for several of their films, such as Nagisa Oshima's Diary of a Shinjuku Thief (1969), Koji Wakamatsu's Shinjuku Mad (screenplay by Masao Adachi), and Funeral Parade of Roses by Toshio Matsumoto.

In 1967, the Art Theatre Guild opened the Scorpio Theatre (Sasori-za) in the basement of its Art Theatre Shinjuku Bunka cinema. The Scorpio Theatre quickly established itself as an influential underground venue for angura theater, music, dance, and film. Its name, proposed by novelist Yukio Mishima, was inspired by Kenneth Anger's film Scorpio Rising (1963). It was at the Sasori-za that Mishima held the first screening of his film Patriotism (1966).

Theater

In 1967, the Modern Art Theater was opened in Shinjuku. Dubbed the "sensational cave," it offered nude shows, avant-garde and entertainment theater, film screenings, and performances. The theater laboratory "Ceiling Pier", which had Tadanori Yokoo as a founding member, also performed there. After the underground boom, the venue was used for striptease performances.

It was in Shinjuku, in the Hanazono shrine, that the first performances of the "Red Tent" (Jokyo Gekijo), the company founded by Juro Kara, took place.

Tatsumi Hijikata and the buto dancers were also closely associated to Shinjuku.

Places

Cafe Fugetsudo, founded by actor Goro Yokoyama, was a rallying point for artists, intellectuals, and homosexuals in the 1960s. Actor Takeshi Kitano, painter Taro Okamoto, transvestite actress Akihiro Miwa, poet Gozo Yoshimasu, and filmmaker Shuji Terayama frequented it.

In the Golden Gai, a small block located east of Kabukicho, many bars have been haunts of artists and protesters.

Folk Guerilla Concerts

In 1969, anti-war group Beheiren organized folk concerts in Shinjuku station. A batch of Japanese anti-Vietnam War activists gathered and were termed "folk guerrillas". In July, a fight with riot police led to the dispersal of the concerts and the arrests of musicians.

Demonstrations

On October 21, 1969, an International Anti-War Day demonstration was violently suppressed, so much so that the daily newspaper Asahi ran the following day's headline: "Guerrilla Warfare in the Heart of Shinjuku."

In 1991, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government moved from the Marunouchi district of Chiyoda to the current building in Shinjuku (the Tokyo International Forum stands at the former site vacated by the government).

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