DESIGNART Tokyo 2026: an art walk from Ginza to Roppongi
by 
Babylon Radio
Listen nowA former expressway above Ginza, a gallery filled with imagined gardens and an installation that lets you hear through your bones: DESIGNART TOKYO is an invitation to see the city differently.
The tenth edition of the design and art festival runs from 30 October to 8 November 2026. Under the theme Hibiki, it brings exhibitions into neighbourhoods including Ginza, Roppongi, Omotesando, Harajuku, Daikanyama and Ikejiri. For anyone getting to know Tokyo, it offers a good reason to turn a familiar shopping trip into an afternoon of discovery.
Ginza’s Chuo Dori, photographed on 18 June 2016. Archive neighbourhood image by Daniel Ramirez, CC BY 2.0. Cropped for display.
Walk above Ginza at AUTOBAHN
The main venue, AUTOBAHN / KK Line, turns part of the former Tokyo Expressway into a temporary meeting place for design. Exhibitions sit alongside a design store, talks and a café area. It is an unusual chance to explore creative work above some of the city’s best-known streets.
This part of the festival runs until 3 November, between the Sukiyabashi intersection and Ginza-itchome. The organiser’s ticket announcement lists on-the-day admission at ¥3,500 for a general one-day ticket, ¥1,500 for students and ¥6,000 for the five-day pass, including tax. Tickets and entrance details are available through ArtSticker.
Hear the city in a new way
At Tokyo Midtown in Roppongi, BONE VOYAGE brings sound directly to the listener through bone-conduction speakers. Created by Fushi Sano and Mio Haruhana, the arm-like device touches the head, changing the listening experience according to where and how it makes contact.
Alongside it, Tempura Object explores what happens when cooking becomes a craft technique. Paper and fibres, rather than food, are transformed through batter and oil into unexpected forms.
The Midtown display is on the Galleria’s second floor, near lucien pellat-finet, until 4 November, from 11am to 8pm. BONE VOYAGE’s remaining scheduled hands-on dates are 1–3 November.
Find an invisible garden
Back in Ginza, POLA Museum Annex offers a quieter encounter. Asami Kiyokawa and Kohei Nawa’s Invisible Garden brings together images, sculpture and ideas about the natural world, memory and imagination.
The centrepiece is a shared work approximately nine metres long. Kiyokawa combines fragments of landscape photography and AI-generated imagery; Nawa covers the surface with transparent cells, changing the way the images appear.
Admission is free. In a 29 October announcement, the museum extended the exhibition to 27 December, giving visitors time to return after DESIGNART ends. The gallery at 1-7-7 Ginza opens from 11am to 7pm, with entry until 6.30pm. On 6–8 November, it opens at 10am. For December visits, it is closed on 16 December and closes at 5pm on 19 December.
Build your own art walk
Hibiya Okuroji, one of DESIGNART’s information-centre locations, photographed on 10 September 2020. Archive venue photograph by 電車(新幹線)でゴー！, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped for display.
The festival’s exhibition directory lets you choose a neighbourhood and follow the work that interests you. Ginza makes a useful starting point for AUTOBAHN and POLA; Roppongi offers the Midtown installations.
For a map and a starting point on the ground, the information centre at Hibiya Okuroji, 1-7-1 Uchisaiwaicho, operates throughout the festival until 8 November. Pick a few stops, leave room for a coffee and enjoy the ideas that appear between them.