Today's Ideas

Japanese Love Hotels

By Amanda Gore (PSFK London) on January 18, 2007

The Morning News has some great photographs of the Japanese phenomenon for wild and creatively decorated love hotels. From Hello Kitty S&M to Gullivers Travels, the 30,000 to 40,000 love hotels in Japan are full of creatively themed rooms that also offer hotel-style extras including video game consoles and big screen TV’s, karaoke machines, and DVD libraries. High-tech automated payment machines reduce the embarresment of human contact, and free gifts are offered as incentives to return. It’s amazing to see how the Japanese manage to incorporate good design and clever technology into every aspect of their lives.

Unlike the dank motels where Americans allegedly seek anonymous sex,
Japan’s love hotels are playful and unapologetically sexual.
Photographer Misty Keasler shows the humor, desire, and even the
loneliness of these empty rooms. Her first monograph, Love Hotels, from Chronicle Books will
be followed by a show of the same title at the Museum of Contemporary
Photography at Columbia College, Jenkins Johnson Gallery New York