Japan’s “haikyo” (廃墟), or “ruins”, are fascinating. They provide a look into a world which time forgot, but French photographer Jordy Meow hasn’t.
Meow has been cataloging haikyo across Japan — from a deserted love hotel in Chiba to an abandoned theme park in Nara.
The photos, courtesy of DailyGeekShow, are hauntingly beautiful:
If you like Meow’s work, The Huffington Post reports that Meow published a French language photo book called Nippon no Haikyo (“Japan’s Ruins”).
Kotaku has previously featured Japanese ruins — and for good reason: one haikyo even inspired a video game.
20 lieux abandonnés qui vous feront voyager dans les vestiges d’un Japon oublié [DailyGeekShow via フランス反応をまとめてみた]
Comments
10 responses to “The Beauty Of Japan’s Abandoned Ruins”
I wonder why they just up and left.
I’ll take a glowing stab in the dark and say radioactive panda’s.
I’m gonna say clickers.
Kaiju.
Honest answer? Severe economic downturn when the bubble burst in 1997. The conomy never really recovered. If you go to places like Choshi in Chiba, you can see a lovely little resort town that lost all its customers and is now kept alive by fishing and having the Kikkoman soy sauce factory.
Kotaku answer? an army of tanuki came in the night and used their huge balls to crush anyone not lucky enough to get away in time.
Well I was after an honest answer so thank you! Kotaku answers have been amusing though. 🙂
Anytime you see any huge unfinished public works, abandoned schools or factories, towns with more boarded up shops than open ones… All remnants of Japan riding on the post-war economy until the 90’s, when the Asian economic collapse destroyed the domestic consumer market.
Lucky for them, most of the government debt is internally owed. The government has consistently bungled fiscal management for about the last 15 years. Karaoke parliament doesn’t help, and neither does the growing right wing “Conservative Values” people who think foreign investment and immigration are evil and the answer to everything is to keep encouraging the terrible system of working people to death in meaningless jobs that they hate while taxing the young to keep the increasingly elderly land owners wealthy.
Not mad. Honest.
I’m amazed that stuff hasn’t been looted.
Petty crime in Japan is practically zero. It’s weird. A friend of mine left his (very nice) camera on the table at a cafe in a busy area on the outskirts of Tokyo. He ran back several hours later to find it still sitting there.
Anyone been to Elizabeth in Adelaide?
Its essentially the same thing… But people still live there.
god, that place is freaky as fuck after 9
Hahaha no joke. South Aussie life, but I think Davoren Park still takes the cream