TOKYO—Explore Tokyo beyond the crowded tourist highlights and you'll find many older parts of the city with a different look and slower pace. One of these, the area around the Metro station Kiyosumi-Shirakawa, is a convenient side trip if you’re visiting the Tokyo Skytree, which is four stops away. There’s a charming local history museum, public garden, coffee shops, and a contemporary art museum.
The neighborhood may not be picturesque in the conventional sense but there’s a lot to see if you have an eye for detail and an appreciation for the charm of urban and slightly shabby locales.
Fukagawa Edo Museum
From the Metro station, head south and turn right onto an old shopping street marked by two small decorative towers. On your right you'll see an old-fashioned candy shop where the proprietor dresses in garb from the Edo period (including an entirely unconvincing wig of a topknot hairstyle). Farther along on the left is the Fukagawa Edo Museum.
Most tourists with any interest in history end up at the Edo Tokyo Museum with its indoor re-creations of historic buildings from the Edo era, which began in the 1600s. The Fukagawa museum, which predates the Edo Tokyo Museum, is much smaller and more charming, with a life-size Edo-period town re-created on its lower level. Be prepared to take your shoes off to go inside the little shops and homes, and a guide with adequate or better English will show you how the old-fashioned locks work and how ropes pull a skylight open over a stove. You can even try a rice-pounding device.
