Yanaka is Tokyo's most intact old neighborhood — a warren of temples, wooden houses, craft shops, and narrow lanes in northern Tokyo that survived the 1923 earthquake and the 1945 firebombing largely unscathed. Walking here feels like stepping back a hundred years, not because it is preserved in amber but because it continued developing at its own pace while the rest of the city was rebuilt from scratch.
The neighbourhood centres on Yanaka Cemetery, the resting place of the last Tokugawa shogun, and Yanaka Ginza, a short covered shopping street that is one of the few surviving examples of the old shōtengai (merchant street) format. The surrounding temples are numerous and mostly free to enter; SCAI The Bathhouse, a 200-year-old public bathhouse converted into a contemporary art gallery, is an easy stop on a temple walk. This is a neighbourhood for walking slowly, looking at small things, and eating at unpretentious places. Avoid weekends if possible; it has become fashionable.