Happy New Year 2024! Because this year is the year of the dragon, I wrote the kanji character for “dragon” on my New Year greeting card. Although it was a rough start for the new year in Japan, wishing everyone a year full of health, happiness and love. 新年明けましておめでとうございます！本年もどうぞよろしくお願いいたします。２０２４年は辰年ということで、今年の年賀状は「龍」の字を書いてみました。 日本では、新年早々に災難が起こってしまいました。これ以上被害が拡大しませんように、被害に遭われた皆様の回復とご無事を願っています。 皆様にとって良い１年になりますように。 The post appeared first on Samantha Mariko ..read more

I hope everyone had a fruitful 2022 this year. I wanted to write a blog post to celebrate one of my biggest accomplishments this year – to have my first piece of Japanese calligraphy exhibited at The National Art Center, Tokyo. “2022 KIRABOSHI” 21st Century Art Borderless Exhibit featured a variety of art genres including Japanese calligraphy. I was halfway into my 2nd year of doing calligraphy when my teacher announced the exhibition and urged me to challenge myself by creating a one-of-a-kind calligraphy piece. In class, we usually practice our calligraphy by copying samples writte ..read more

Happy New Year 2022! I know it’s a month late, but I really wanted to share this Japanese-style New Year’s postcard I made (yes, it is hand-written!). 2021 was an interesting year for me – it was a pretty rough start to be honest, but I was somehow able to turn things around by the end of the year. I made many new discoveries about myself, as well as some big life changes. One of those discoveries/changes was taking up a brand new hobby in the form of Japanese calligraphy. “Why Japanese calligraphy?” you may ask. My Japanese grandfather was a professional calligrapher, but unfortunately passed ..read more

I believe many people are itching to travel like the pre-pandemic days, myself included. While I could travel abroad right now if I wanted to, imagining the increased wait time at airports and the quarantining period fills me with dread. Which is why a recent staycation courtesy of Aloft Tokyo Ginza was a welcome treat. コロナ禍がここまで続くと、みんなは海外へ行きたくてうずうずしていると思う。実は、私もその中の一人です。もちろん、どうしてもどこか行きたいと思ったらいけるのだろうけど、空港での待ち時間や様々な手続のことを考えてしまうと、いく気が失せてしまうというか・・・そこで、Aloft Tokyo Ginzaから一泊招待が来た時は、とてもタイムリーだったので、紹介したいと思います。 Aloft Tokyo Ginza is a boutique hotel that opened in October of last year, and is ..read more

This is a long overdue post, as I visited this gallery space back in June; however, I still want to share photos from the opening exhibition because NANZUKA UNDERGROUND is already one of my favorite art spaces in Tokyo. NANZUKA UNDERGROUND had a successful grand opening of its new flagship gallery located in Jingumae, Shibuya, Tokyo, near United Arrows Harajuku. The gallery was built with Tetsuya Nakamura’s custom paint facade and Hajime Sorayama’s design emblem. The kick-off exhibition was a solo exhibition of new works by Masato Mori which started on June 5th. NANZUKA UNDERGROUND ..read more

At the beginning of 2020, I was excited for many things, and one of those was the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. For the first time in my life, I would be in the city that would host the Olympic Games. I even had a job booked for the Olympics, which had become a dream of mine ever since Tokyo was chosen to host the 2020 games. Although COVID-19 dramatically changed the course of events, pushing the Olympics back an entire year among many other things, I would still like to believe that there was a bit of good that came out of it. On the opening day of the Olympics, I noticed how normal the streets of Gi ..read more

Happy 2021 all! I hope everyone is having a great New Year despite the circumstances. Tokyo is under another state of emergency with a curfew, meaning many eateries and club venues are closing earlier or are closed for the time being. I’m glad my La Fondue Tokyo team was able to host this Winter Formal event last month. It is a bit overdue, but I am so proud of our photo booth set up that there’s no way I’m not sharing photos! 皆さん、新年あけましておめでとうございます！現在都内では緊急事態宣言が再び出ましたが、皆さんにとって良い一年になることを願っています。先月記事アップを予定していたのがだいぶ遅くなりましたが、去年の１２月５日に開催したウィンターフォーマルのイベントについて書きたいなと思いました。 We held our first ..read more

This is a very long overdue post. Last month, my Vivaci Tokyo team finally held our second event at TRUNK(HOTEL) on the theme of sustainability and the environment. This post will mainly be a quick recap with a majority of the post being photos. この記事は１ヶ月前にアップするはずだったのが、もう既に11月末・・・先月、Vivaci Tokyo第２回のイベントをTRUNK(HOTEL)で開催することができました。今回のテーマは「環境」と「サステナビリティ」。写真多めのイベントまとめ記事になります！ Just to recap on what Vivaci Tokyo is all about: Vivaci Tokyo a new playground showcasing the lifestyles and work ethics of leading inspirational figures within the fashion, music, and art scene. A derivative of La ..read more

Beauty and skincare have been such an important part of my daily routine for a while now. Even though I haven’t posted much recently about my routine or new/favorite products I’ve been trying, I thought this would be a great opportunity to share my experience with products from the world-renowned beauty brand, DHC. They recently reached out to me to try two of their cleansing oils – the DHC Deep Cleansing Oil and the DHC Deep Cleansing Oil Renewed & Brightened. 私にとって、美容とスキンケアは日頃のルーティーンに欠かせないものです。本当はもっとブログに普段使っているアイテムや、新しく発見したものをシェアすべきなのですが・・・今回、世界的に注目を浴びているビューティーブランドDHCから人気の「DHC ..read more

So, I did a thing for my birthday. I released my first single “714-LUVTIDE” on major online platforms! 実は・・本日誕生日に新しいシングルをリリースすることになりました！ “Samantha Mariko makes her debut as a singer/songwriter with a summer house track, “714-LUTVIDE,” on her 30th birthday to welcome a new era of creativity in music. With a B.A. in piano performance from UCLA and experience singing in choirs and several original tracks previously in her career, Samantha combines her musical talents to produce a tropical disco-themed house track that is perfect for summertime. While the digits “714” indicate her birthdate, the ..read more