Kawasaki · TamaNo.856★★Open in map →
Fujiko F Fujio Museum
— The Doraemon artist's museum in Kawasaki
A museum on the Tama hills in Kawasaki built around the original drawings of Fujiko F Fujio, the artist who created Doraemon. Entry is by a date-and-time ticket bought in advance, and the cinema, café and rooftop lawn are all included.
- FromMukogaoka-Yuen Station (Odakyu Odawara Line)
- ~16 minOdakyu line, then 16 min on foot
- Fujiko F Fujio Museum
The sweet spot
There is nothing undiscovered about this. It is a city museum about the most famous cartoon character in Japan. What keeps it from feeling like a crush is the ticket: a fixed date, a fixed hour, a limited number of people inside, and no counter at the gate that will sell you a way around it.
Where it is
43 more notes in Kanagawa · open the map →What to look for — in walking order
- Exhibition Room 1the first of the two rooms of original drawings, pages and colour work from the strips
- The artist's studya recreation of the desk, shelves and materials he worked at
- F Theatrea small cinema running short films made for the museum and shown nowhere else
- The rooftop lawnopen ground on the roof where the characters stand out in the air, cameras allowed
- The café and the shopthe museum kitchen, which cooks dishes out of the strips, and the shop by the exit
How to actually get there
- Odakyu Odawara Line to Mukogaoka-Yuen Station.
- South side, then sixteen minutes on foot southeast towards the hills.
- Enter at the hour printed on the ticket, and take Exhibition Rooms 1 and 2 first.
- On through the study and the cinema, then up to the rooftop lawn before the café and the shop.
- Mukogaoka-Yuen to the museum
- Mukogaoka-Yuen is on the Odakyu Odawara Line. Leave by the south side and the museum is sixteen minutes on foot, southeast along the road under the hills. Coming in on the JR Nambu Line instead, Shuku-Gawara Station is fifteen minutes away on foot from the other direction.
- Going back
- The walk back to Mukogaoka-Yuen is the same sixteen minutes. The shuttle bus also runs the other way, to Noborito, which is the larger interchange of the two and the better start for anywhere beyond Kawasaki. The museum closes at 18:00, so the journey home is never a late one.
About the place
The museum stands against a wooded slope in Tama Ward, on the northwestern edge of Kawasaki, a low concrete building with planting along its roofline. What it holds is the artist's own work on paper. Two exhibition rooms carry the original pages and colour plates, and a recreation of the study he drew in stands beside them. Past those are a small cinema showing films made only for the museum, a room of the animals and creatures from the strips, a café and a shop. Cameras are not allowed in the exhibition rooms or the cinema. On the roof there is a lawn where the characters stand outdoors, and that is where cameras come out.
How to enjoy it
The museum is open from 10:00 to 18:00 and lets people in by the hour, so the time printed on your ticket, not the length of a queue, sets the shape of the visit. Take an early slot and the exhibition rooms are at their quietest before the middle of the day; take a later one and you finish on the rooftop with the light coming off the hills. It closes on Tuesdays and over the new year.
Background & history
Fujiko F Fujio is the pen name of the artist who created Doraemon, and Kawasaki is the city he worked in. The museum opened in his name on 3 September 2011, built into a slope in Tama Ward to hold his original artwork. Because that artwork is paper and the rooms around it are small, the visit is metered rather than open: you choose a date and an hour when you book, you enter within that hour, and the ticket is bought online before you set out. There is no window at the entrance selling admission on the day.
Before you go
- Cash
- Admission is 1,000 yen for adults, 700 yen for junior and senior high school students and 500 yen for children of four and over, with under-threes free. The ticket is bought online in advance rather than at the door, so the money goes before you travel.
- Before you go
- Closed on Tuesdays and over the new year holiday. Tickets are issued for a date and an hour and are not sold on the day, so an unplanned visit does not work here. Cameras and phones are not allowed in the exhibition rooms or the cinema.
- Another way
- From Noborito Station, where the Odakyu and JR Nambu lines meet, a shuttle bus runs direct to the museum. That is the easier approach with small children, with a pushchair or in the rain.
- After you get off
- Leave Mukogaoka-Yuen on the south side and walk southeast along the road that runs below the hills. The museum is on the left where the slope begins, about sixteen minutes on. The shuttle bus from Noborito sets down at the entrance itself.