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As Japan continues to be among the world’s most popular luxury travel destinations, it’s no wonder that new hotels are the talk of the town—especially in Tokyo. And why my visit to the JW Marriott Tokyo, a soaring project in adjacent Takanawa Gateway City (the brand’s second in the country), was well worth the flight: Add in a high-speed train journey to Nara, the serene neighbor to buzzy Kyoto, for a mindful few days at the JW Marriott Hotel Nara and a special up-close-and-personal morning with four-legged friends at Nara Park? It was an irresistible investigation.
First, Tokyo and JW Marriott Tokyo. While it’s hard to think of this whirling, fascinating capital city as a serene escape, a new design and services philosophy at JW Marriott provides the complement: a dedicated floor of nine Mindful Rooms & Suites. How did this translate in a new tower astride a humming new complex of transit links and a dense, vibrant new retail center? Frankly, mindfully.
Courtesy of JW Marriott Hotel Tokyo
JW Marriott Hotel Tokyo: A Journey to Mindful
While JW Marriott’s rollout of its Mindful Rooms & Suites in late 2025 was the news most heralding the hotel’s grand opening in October, I’d argue that all 200 rooms and suites at the hotel tune to the key of well-being, with a stunning use of natural materials throughout the hotel. The design journey—led by Toronto/New York–based design studio Yabu Pushelberg—begins with the ground-level entrance in rich, dark woods, a Zen rock garden, and a mirrored depiction of Mount Fuji, then rises to the 30th-floor reception area.
Here, the world beyond enters the experience: views of the Tokyo Bay horizon line and nearby Gotenyama Hill receive interior complements via cloudscape-summoning art pieces, a nod to traditional Kamakura-bori lacquerware, along with photographic art from Sho Makishima that echoes the ephemeral qualities of light and sky. The gentle punctuation of a tree in full leaf elsewhere in the lobby turns out to be a brilliant collaboration in glass from Lasvit, the New York–based studio known for bravura, sculptural illuminations using Czech-crafted glass.
Courtesy of JW Marriott Hotel Tokyo
Can the Japanese culinary practice of omakase describe a hospitality experience? I say yes. In the guest floors below the crowning reception area, my room represents a refinement of the journey so far of design-informed moments into one of wood-wrapped sanctuary. Here, my floor-to-ceiling Lost in Translation view of a sweep of the Tokyo skyline is framed by pale timber and softened by curved silhouettes of sofa and chairs. For a hotel that seeks to swaddle businesspeople in luxurious but useful comfort but also meet the growing demand of leisure travelers seeking connection to place, it’s a deft, harmonious balancing act. Hundreds of feet above the thrilling culture alit in Tokyo, I feel connected to Japan’s deeper design principles and philosophies. I also feel surprisingly serene. Quite a feat.
Courtesy of JW Marriott Hotel Tokyo
What makes the Mindful Rooms & Suites more mindful even than this infrastructure allows? Layering: lighting that is circadian-tuned to move the mind through a day’s natural rhythms; a dedicated meditation space (complete with yoga mat), a spa-like bathing area, and organic herbal teas (it is Japan, after all). In the signature Spa by JW, the treatment menu rests on four elements—Calm, Invigorate, Indulge, and Renew—to inform the character of essential oils and treatments, like using warmed lapis lazuli stones and a calming oil containing arnica, eucalyptus, and blue tansy to smooth away anxiety, or being rolled by bamboo to release toxins. Serenity secured.
Courtesy of JW Marriott Hotel Nara
JW Marriott Hotel Nara: The Spiritual Retreat
To move through Japan as a visitor is always a chance to experience the interconnection of nature to human life. Which made the high-speed whisk from the (literal!) downstairs station at Takanawa Gateway to Kyoto a two-hour chance to catch one’s breath anew and retreat to JW Marriott’s first hotel in Japan, about 25 miles south of the now-famed cultural hub in the historic, fascinating city of Nara, where temples, nature, and some remarkable deer awaited.
First, an unabashed plug for Nara: Now a bit outshone by Kyoto’s huge tourism moment, Nara is a stirring, resonant place to be away from the teeming crowds, and the decision of JW Marriott to locate here in 2020 underscores that point. It’s got history in spades: As Japan’s first permanent capital (710–784 CE), the UNESCO World Heritage city supports a stunning collection of historic Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines (including Hōryū-ji Temple, which houses the world’s oldest surviving wooden structures)—a veritable core sample of Japanese culture, art, and architecture. Surrounding these landmarks is the forested Nara Park, where nearly 1,500 sacred deer roam at will among the antiquities.
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The famous deer roaming around Nara Park.
The deer, while technically wild, have adopted two behaviors that somehow remain elegant, despite the obvious lure to the tourists who make it to Nara. First, they’ve learned to “bow”—to lower their heads intentionally—to receive a deer cracker from visitors (yes, the crackers are for sale, and yes, if you’re near deer, they’re expecting it and might deliver a head-butt prompt). They also come running—galloping, really—to a musician playing strains of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony (the Pastoral, of course) on a French horn—a century-plus-old ritual called Shikayose that feels like something cooked up by Walt Disney and Hayao Miyazaki. (It is now performed on special dates by the Nara Deer Preservation Foundation.)
Courtesy of JW Marriott Hotel Nara
The JW Marriott Hotel Nara knows its place—literally. The collaboration of Tokyo-based TASEI architects and international design collective GA Design has created a vividly soothing blend of modern urbanity with a warm welcome more akin to a grand residence, or a lodge, with very Nara notes throughout. Like her younger Tokyo sister, this JW Marriott leans into timber for walls and beams, the latter being a knowing nod to ancient houses and temples. Light pendants inspired by spherical furin wind chimes float above the lobby with “secret messages” hanging below. A linear fireplace not only warms up the space in the forested, lodge-forward sensibility, but reckons Nara’s historic fire festivals. And of course, a misted, near-mythic stag overlooks the scene in a massive impressionist painting above the aptly named Flying Stag bar. The Nara deer are revered as messengers of the gods, and the presence of one here makes the connection.
It’s amazing to spend a week living surrounded by walls crafted from timbers. My room here—one of 158—cocoons in a manner that feels surprisingly restorative. Is it as easy as harvesting the natural world for inspiration and construction? Perhaps at the root, this is the source of serenity, and in two very historic and modern Japanese cities, it’s a compelling journey to a calmed spirit and an opened mind.