A projection mapping event was held for the first time this month at Senso-ji Temple in Tokyo’s Asakusa district. Over five days starting December 3, the free show drew applause from many tourists. It formed part of the Asakusa Culture & Lights 2025 program.
A projection mapping event took place for the first time at Senso-ji Temple in Taito Ward, Tokyo, running for five days from December 3. After sunset, images of traditional temple ceremonies and large ema paintings preserved in Ema Hall were projected onto the Hozo-mon Gate, the five-story pagoda, and the Niten-mon Gate. Sessions lasted about six minutes each, repeated over four hours daily.
Tourists flocked to the free display, applauding after every showing. Organized under the Asakusa Culture & Lights 2025 program, the event also featured paid access to Denboin Garden and Ema Hall for the first time in seven years. Denboin Garden, a strolling garden within the temple's main quarters, dates back about 1,400 years, making Senso-ji Tokyo's oldest temple. Designed in the first half of the 17th century by renowned landscape architect Kobori Enshu, it is a national scenic spot typically closed to the public, with views that shift as visitors walk through.
Ema Hall houses more than 200 valuable ema votive paintings, mostly from the Edo period (1603-1867), preserved as the temple's treasures. These painted plaques, offered at shrines and temples to convey wishes or thanks to deities, sometimes depict horses as substitutes for live offerings. Originally hung along the nageshi horizontal beams in the main hall, they are now stored in Ema Hall and rarely open to visitors.
An executive committee planned the event, produced by digital creative firm Hitohata, Inc., and funded by a Cultural Affairs Agency subsidy to promote engaging uses of cultural properties. In 2028, the temple will commemorate the 1,400th anniversary of discovering its principal Kannon statue in the Sumida River.
