Yanaka Ginza (Photo by Shoji Kudaka/Stripes Japan)

Yanaka Ginza is often talked about in the context of “Showa Retro,” a concept of longing for the old days of the Showa Era (1926 – 1989). The old buildings lined up along the streets in the neighborhood have been drawing such nostalgic minds who are looking to explore a different side of Tokyo away from busy Shibuya or Shinjuku. Among all the spots in the neighborhood, the shopping street would be the go-to location for the old-fashioned downtown vibe.

Running 170 meters east to west, this old shopping street is home to about 60 shops, many of which are housed in small wooden buildings.

According to a report by Toyo Keizai, this street is thought to have started as a black market around 1945. Shortly after the war, the residents who came back to the neighborhood set up stalls to sell commodities. Since many parts of the neighborhood were spared, fortunately, when Tokyo was air raided as well as in the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923, old streets and wooden buildings remained undamaged.

You won’t find big chain stores here which preserves the nostalgic atmosphere. Tourists go there looking for accessories, sweets, and snack food that they can’t get anywhere else and we were no exception.

I was looking to try Yanaka Menchi, a popular menchi katsu (fried cake of minced meat) sold at Niku no Sato, a meat store. Some of my fellow travelers, on the other hand, wanted to check out Jaakuna Hankoya Shinimonogurui, a stamp store where you can buy custom hanko signature stamps with goofy animal caricatures.

When we arrived at the shopping street, however, it was still around 9 a.m., and all the shops on the street were not open yet. I regretted my bad planning, but it was too late, and we ended up walking on the street without having any snack food or anywhere to buy accessories.

The disappointment didn’t end there. Yanaka Ginza is known for being the home to many stray cats as marked by the countless cat paintings and sculptures on shop signs and rooftops. On the eastern end of the shopping street, the Yuyake Dandan stairs are a documented hot spot for the neighborhood alley cats. This day, however, it was like cats had never existed here.

With no snack food to try, no accessories to buy, and no “real” cats to play with, it did not take us long to walk down the quiet 170-meter street.

Later, I found a report by Gendai Business from 2024 that said the Yanaka Ginza felines are no longer a common sight since a local movement to protect those stray cats from precarious life on the street gained consensus in the area.

If you plan to visit, don’t expect to see any real cats and plan to be there after 10 or 11 a.m. when the shops open. On a different day, I visited around 5 p.m. and found the area crowded with tourists, lining up in front of the meat store for a fried cake of minced meat and shopping for cat accessories.

At the Yuyake Dandan, there were many tourists taking selfies with the shopping street in the background. “Yuyake” means “sunset,” while “Dandan” refers to “steps.” As the name suggests, the stairs were beautifully lit by the evening glow.

(Photo by Shoji Kudaka/Stripes Japan)

Yanaka Ginza (Photo by Shoji Kudaka/Stripes Japan)

(Photo by Shoji Kudaka/Stripes Japan)

Yanaka Ginza Shotengai (shopping street)