Walk out the Shiodome exit of JR Shimbashi Station, head toward the Yurikamome monorail, and after two or three minutes you'll find a small brick building. This is the Former Shimbashi Station. A faithful reconstruction, it stands on the exact spot where Japan's first railway terminal once was.
On October 14, 1872, the first railway in Japan opened between Shimbashi and Yokohama. The distance: about 29 kilometers. Travel time: roughly 53 minutes.
Commodore Perry's Black Ships had appeared off the coast of Uraga in 1853. A country that had been stunned by the sight of steam-powered vessels was running its own railway just 19 years later.
This article covers the 44 years between the Meiji Restoration (1868) and the end of the Meiji era (1912) — how Japan transformed in that span. It's the next chapter after what I wrote in "250 Years of Isolation, Then the Black Ships," about the opening of Japan and the Restoration itself. The stage is Tokyo. The Former Shimbashi Station, Ginza, Tokyo Station, Meiji Jingū. Walk through these places and you can still see the traces of modernization.
The Iwakura Mission — Half the Government Left the Country
107 People, a Journey of One Year and Ten Months
Three years after its founding, the Meiji government made a remarkable decision.
In December 1871, a delegation of 107 people — including key government leaders — departed Yokohama for America. The head of the mission was Iwakura Tomomi, the Udaijin (effectively the number-two official in the government). His deputies were Ōkubo Toshimichi, Kido Takayoshi, Itō Hirobumi, and Yamaguchi Naoyoshi. All of them were at the center of the Meiji government.
The official purpose was to renegotiate the unequal treaties Japan had been forced to sign at the end of the Edo period. But it quickly became clear that treaty revision was a non-starter, and the mission shifted its focus to observation and study.
America, Britain, France, Germany, Russia, Italy, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Austria. Twelve countries in all. They returned to Japan in September 1873, after one year and ten months abroad.
The core of the government had been out of the country for nearly two years. And this was a newborn nation. The caretaker government was led by Saigō Takamori and Itagaki Taisuke, but during the mission's absence, the Seikanron debate erupted — a proposal to use military force to open Korea. When Iwakura and Ōkubo returned, they clashed with Saigō, triggering the Political Crisis of 1873.
What They Saw, What They Learned
What shocked the mission most was Europe's industrial might.
Kume Kunitake, the official chronicler, compiled the Beiō Kairan Jikki (A True Account of the Tour of America and Europe), which documented factories, railways, harbors, hospitals, schools, courthouses, parliaments, and arsenals in exhaustive detail. This was no sightseeing diary. What powers the machines? How is iron smelted? What are the rules of parliamentary procedure? The observations were relentlessly practical.
Ōkubo Toshimichi was shaken by what he saw of Britain's Industrial Revolution. After returning, he created the Ministry of Home Affairs and launched the policy of promoting industry and enterprise. Itō Hirobumi took particular note of Prussia's constitutional system, which would later influence his drafting of the Meiji Constitution.
What matters here is that the mission didn't just see the surface of Western civilization — they saw the underside too. The terrible conditions of factory workers in Britain. Urban poverty. The realities of colonial rule. They acknowledged the West's advancement, but came away knowing that blind imitation was not the answer. That awareness shaped policy after their return.
Bunmei Kaika and Ginza — The Brick District Experiment
The Ginza Brick Quarter
The defining phrase of early Meiji Japan was Bunmei Kaika — "civilization and enlightenment." It referred to the rapid adoption of Western institutions, technology, and lifestyles.
Ginza was its showcase.
In February 1872, a massive fire swept through the Ginza district. The government seized the opportunity to rebuild the wooden neighborhood entirely in brick. The architect in charge was Thomas James Waters, one of the many foreign specialists — known as oyatoi gaikokujin — hired by the Meiji government.
The completed Ginza Brick Quarter featured orderly rows of two-story brick buildings, tree-lined streets, and gas lamps. Tokyo's first gas lamps were installed here in 1874 (Japan's first had been lit in 1872 along Bashamichi in Yokohama). There were even arcaded sidewalks.
But the brick quarter wasn't exactly a success. Brick construction didn't suit Japan's hot, humid climate. The buildings trapped moisture and were uncomfortable to live in. Rents were high, and vacancies piled up. It looked modern, but it didn't fit the lives of the people who were supposed to live there.
This tension — surface-level Westernization bumping up against reality — ran through the entire Bunmei Kaika period. The zangiri hairstyle (cutting off the traditional topknot for a Western look), Western clothing, beef hot pot (the precursor to sukiyaki). Visible changes came fast, but changing the substance of society took much longer.
What Became of Ginza
The brick quarter was almost entirely destroyed by the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923, and none of the original buildings survive in today's Ginza. But the image of Ginza as Japan's most modern commercial district started in this era. The luxury boutiques lining Ginza today are a direct continuation of what the Meiji brick quarter set in motion.
Institutional Modernization — What Changed in 44 Years
The Meiji government didn't just change how things looked. It rebuilt the skeleton of the nation.
Compulsory Education (from 1872)
The Education Order of 1872 declared that all children — regardless of social status or gender — were to receive an education. Japan already had terakoya (private elementary schools) during the Edo period, and literacy rates were high by global standards of the time. But compulsory education as a system began here.
Enrollment rates were low at first. Tuition was expensive, and families needed their children as laborers. Girls' enrollment was far lower than boys'. It wasn't until the 1900s that enrollment exceeded 90 percent.
Conscription (1873)
The Conscription Act of 1873 imposed military service on all adult males — not just the shizoku (former samurai class). In a sense, this was the exact opposite of what I wrote about in "The Foot Soldier's Son Who Conquered Japan" regarding Hideyoshi's sword hunt. Hideyoshi disarmed the peasants to separate warriors from farmers. The Meiji government armed the entire population and abolished the warrior class as a privileged group.
For the former samurai, fighting had been their reason for existing. When military service became everyone's obligation, they lost their special status. Samurai uprisings broke out across the country. The largest was the Satsuma Rebellion of 1877, in which Saigō Takamori led a samurai army that was defeated by a conscript force of farmers.
Railways (from 1872)
The Shimbashi–Yokohama railway mentioned at the start of this article was built under the direction of Edmund Morel, a British engineer. Morel died of illness in 1871 at the age of 30, before the line even opened. His grave is in the Yokohama Foreign General Cemetery.
By 1889, the Tōkaidō Main Line (Tokyo to Kobe) was fully open. Private railway companies sprang up one after another. Railways were more than transportation — they were the infrastructure for delivering central government orders nationwide and moving troops rapidly.
The Constitution (1889)
On February 11, 1889, the Constitution of the Empire of Japan was promulgated. The Ottoman Empire's Midhat Constitution (1876) came earlier, but it was suspended after just two years. The Meiji Constitution can be called the first modern constitution in Asia to function continuously.
The lead drafter was Itō Hirobumi. Drawing on his experience with the Iwakura Mission, he modeled it on the Prussian (German) constitution. Why Prussia, and not Britain or France? Britain's parliament was too powerful. France was a country where the king had been executed in a revolution. To build a modern political system while preserving the Emperor's authority, the Prussian model — where the monarch held strong prerogatives — was the most convenient choice.
The constitution declared the Emperor "sacred and inviolable" and vested sovereignty in him. A parliament (the Imperial Diet) was established, but it was not designed to constrain the Emperor's authority. The separation of authority and power that I described in "The Void at the Heart of Tokyo" remained intact under the Meiji Constitution. The document said the Emperor held sovereign power, but the people who actually ran the government were the hambatsu — politicians from the Satsuma and Chōshū domains.
Modernization in Architecture — From Foreign Experts to Japanese Architects
Josiah Conder
The Meiji government hired foreign specialists across every field. These oyatoi gaikokujin (hired foreigners) numbered in the hundreds at their peak.
The most influential in architecture was the British architect Josiah Conder. He arrived in Japan in 1877 at the age of 24 and taught architecture at the Imperial College of Engineering (now the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Tokyo).
Buildings designed by Conder include the Rokumeikan (1883, a social hall for entertaining foreigners; no longer standing), Nikolai Cathedral (1891, in Ochanomizu; still standing), and the Former Iwasaki Residence (1896, in Ueno; still standing, designated an Important Cultural Property).
But Conder's importance isn't just in the buildings he left behind. It's in the Japanese students he trained — they built the next era.
Tatsuno Kingo and Tokyo Station
The most famous of Conder's students was Tatsuno Kingo.
Tatsuno was from Karatsu in Saga Prefecture and one of the first graduates of the Imperial College of Engineering. After studying under Conder, he spent three years in Britain and returned to become a professor at the Imperial College (later the Imperial University of Tokyo, Faculty of Engineering).
His masterpiece is the Tokyo Station Marunouchi Building (completed 1914). The contrast of red brick and white granite, the domes at the north and south ends, the 335-meter-long facade. Tatsuno took the British Queen Anne style as his foundation and added his own variations.
Another major work is the Bank of Japan Main Building (completed 1896). A Neo-Baroque structure modeled on the National Bank of Belgium, there's a popular claim that the building looks like the kanji for "yen" (円) when seen from above — though it's unclear whether this was actually intended at the design stage.
The Conder-to-Tatsuno progression is the archetypal pattern of Meiji modernization. First, learn from foreigners. In the next generation, do it yourself. Learn, absorb, make it your own. This cycle played out simultaneously across railways, the military, law, medicine, and architecture.
Meiji Jingū — The Emperor Who Led Modernization
Emperor Meiji and Modernization
On July 30, 1912, Emperor Meiji died. He had reigned for 45 years. During that time, Japan went from a feudal warrior state to a modern nation.
How much Emperor Meiji personally drove modernization is debated among historians. At the start of the Restoration, the Emperor was a 15-year-old boy. Real policy decisions were made by politicians from Satsuma and Chōshū — Ōkubo Toshimichi, Kido Takayoshi, Itō Hirobumi, and others.
But the Emperor fulfilled his role as a symbol of modernization. He adopted Western dress, cut his hair, began eating meat, and introduced Western-style court ceremonies. He held supreme command of the army and navy and attended Imperial Headquarters meetings. During the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–95), he moved to the Imperial Headquarters in Hiroshima, signaling his direct involvement in the war effort.
As I wrote in "The Void at the Heart of Tokyo," the Emperor remained a symbol of authority. But the Meiji Emperor was different from the ethereal figure of the Heian period or the secluded occupant of Kyoto during the Edo era. The Meiji era created a new image of the Emperor: the head of state of a modern nation.
The Construction of Meiji Jingū
After Emperor Meiji's death, a popular movement arose calling for a shrine to enshrine the Emperor. The government responded by establishing Meiji Jingū in 1920.
The site had originally been the suburban estate of Katō Kiyomasa (a vassal of Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the builder of Kumamoto Castle), and later became the garden of the Ii clan. Roughly 100,000 trees donated from across the country were planted across the approximately 700,000 square meters of the grounds. The planting was designed so that the forest would become a natural woodland in 100 years — and indeed, today's Meiji Jingū forest looks like a natural forest despite being almost entirely man-made.
Meiji Jingū's main buildings were destroyed by air raids in 1945 but rebuilt in 1958. It draws the most visitors for hatsumōde (the first shrine visit of the new year) of any shrine in Japan — roughly 3 million people each year.
Visiting Guide — Walking Through Meiji-Era Modernization
Former Shimbashi Station
The birthplace of Japanese railways. The current building is a faithful exterior reconstruction of the original station (opened 2003).
Beneath the building, the stone platform and track remnants from the original station have been preserved and can be viewed through glass panels. Inside, an exhibition room hosts free displays on the history of railways.
A five-minute walk from Shimbashi Station. Also walkable from Ginza. It's small, but knowing that Japan's modern era began right here with a railway changes the way you see it.
Ginza
Nothing remains of the Meiji brick quarter, but the fact that Ginza has stayed Japan's most modern commercial district is a continuation of a history that started with Bunmei Kaika.
Stand at the Ginza 4-chōme intersection and you'll see the clock tower on the Wako Building. During the Edo period, a bell for telling the time stood at this spot. In the Meiji era, it became a clock tower. The continuity of this place as a timekeeper has lasted for centuries.
Tokyo Station Marunouchi Building
Tatsuno Kingo's masterpiece. Opened in 1914.
The north and south domes were destroyed in World War II air raids, and the postwar emergency repairs reduced the building from three stories to two. In 2012, it was restored to its original three-story, domed appearance.
The restoration involved exhaustive research into the original construction methods and materials. Inside the station, the Tokyo Station Gallery uses the very red-brick walls that Tatsuno built as the gallery's own walls — you can touch 100-year-old architecture directly.
Looking at the station from the Marunouchi side, you can see the Imperial Palace forest behind it. Tokyo Station sits directly in front of the Imperial Palace, and this alignment was deliberate. The Emperor's residence and the nation's gateway. Tokyo Station was designed not just as transportation infrastructure, but as a symbol of the modern state.
Bank of Japan Main Building
A 10-minute walk from Tokyo Station. Tatsuno Kingo's other major work. Completed 1896.
A solid Neo-Baroque stone building, designated an Important Cultural Property. The interior can be visited by guided tour with advance reservation.
Meiji Jingū
Step out of Harajuku Station and a massive torii gate appears. Walk along the main approach (Omotesandō) for about 10 minutes to reach the main hall. The forest is so dense you'll forget you're in the middle of the city.
As I wrote above, this forest was planned and planted 100 years ago. The planting scheme anticipated the transition from conifers to broadleaf trees, and today the forest is primarily evergreen broadleaf species like shii (Castanopsis) and kashi (evergreen oaks).
After paying your respects at the main hall, take the south approach toward the Treasure House to see personal belongings and portraits of Emperor Meiji.
Closing
In the 44 years of the Meiji era, Japan changed. Railways ran, brick buildings rose, a constitution was written, a parliament was opened, compulsory education began.
But if you leave it at "Japan changed," you miss something.
The Shimbashi station was built by foreign engineers. The Ginza brick quarter was designed by a foreign architect. But the man who designed Tokyo Station — Tatsuno Kingo — was Japanese. The gap between those two moments: just 40 years. Learn from foreigners, study abroad, come home and build it yourself. That cycle was the reality of Meiji modernization.
Walk from the Former Shimbashi Station to Tokyo Station and the straight-line distance is about 2 kilometers. Within those 2 kilometers, 40 years are compressed — from the beginning, built by foreigners, to the culmination, built by Japan's own hands.
📍 Practical Information
Former Shimbashi Station Railway History Exhibition
Admission: Free
Hours: 10:00–17:00 (last entry 16:45)
Closed: Mondays (if Monday is a holiday, closed the following Tuesday), year-end/New Year holidays, during exhibition changeovers
Time needed: 20–30 minutes
Access: 5-minute walk from JR Shimbashi Station (Shiodome exit) / 3-minute walk from Toei Ōedo Line Shiodome Station
Tokyo Station Marunouchi Building
Admission: Exterior viewing is free
Tokyo Station Gallery: Adults ¥1,300, high school/university students ¥1,100, junior high school and under free (varies by exhibition)
Hours: 10:00–18:00 (until 20:00 on Fridays; last entry 30 minutes before closing)
Closed: Mondays (if Monday is a holiday, closed the following weekday), year-end/New Year holidays, during exhibition changeovers
Time needed: Exterior only 15 minutes; with gallery, 60–90 minutes
Access: Directly at JR Tokyo Station, Marunouchi exit
Bank of Japan Main Building
Admission: Free (guided tour with advance reservation via the Bank of Japan website)
Tour duration: Approximately 60 minutes
Closed: Weekends, national holidays, year-end/New Year holidays
Access: 1-minute walk from Tokyo Metro Hanzōmon Line Mitsukoshimae Station (exit B1)
Meiji Jingū
Admission: Shrine grounds free
Meiji Jingū Museum: Adults ¥1,000, high school students and under ¥900, children under elementary school age free
Hours: Opens at sunrise, closes at sunset (varies by month; roughly 5:00–6:40 opening, 16:00–18:30 closing)
Time needed: Worship only 40–60 minutes; with Treasure House and Museum 90–120 minutes
Access: 1-minute walk from JR Yamanote Line Harajuku Station / 1-minute walk from Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line Meiji-jingūmae Station
Ginza
Chūō-dōri (Ginza's main street) becomes a pedestrian zone on weekends and holidays, 12:00–17:00 (until 18:00 seasonally)
Wako Building (Ginza 4-chōme intersection): Exterior always viewable. Ground floor is a high-end watch shop
Access: Directly at Tokyo Metro Ginza Line Ginza Station
Getting Between Locations
Former Shimbashi Station → Ginza: approx. 10-minute walk
Ginza → Tokyo Station: approx. 15-minute walk
Tokyo Station → Bank of Japan Main Building: approx. 10-minute walk
Tokyo Station → Meiji Jingū (Harajuku): approx. 25 minutes by JR Yamanote Line
Nearby Recommendations
Former Iwasaki Residence (Ueno. Western-style mansion designed by Josiah Conder. Important Cultural Property. Adults ¥400)
Nikolai Cathedral (Ochanomizu. Russian Orthodox cathedral designed by Conder. Admission ¥300)
KITTE Building in Marunouchi (former Tokyo Central Post Office. Rooftop terrace offers a full view of Tokyo Station. See also "The Void at the Heart of Tokyo")
▶ Other articles in this series:
The Void at the Heart of Tokyo — Why a powerless Emperor has lasted 2,600 years. The Imperial Palace and the very foundation of Japanese history
The Shogun Who Became a God — Why was Tokugawa Ieyasu enshrined as a deity after death? Nikkō Tōshōgū and the man who built 260 years of peace
The Foot Soldier's Son Who Conquered Japan — Toyotomi Hideyoshi. From the lowest rank to supreme ruler. The greatest upset in Japanese history, carved into Osaka Castle
We strive for historical accuracy in this article, but the author is not a professional historian and some details may be inaccurate. Practical information such as admission fees and opening hours is subject to change — please check official websites for the latest details before visiting.
