Tokyolife gets some loving display space at Colette in Paris.

What is TB.Pensar? Find out here.

I couldn’t very well let this day pass without mentioning that it’s my birthday, although I think vanity is finally going to prevent me from disclosing what number I’ve now hit (not that a quick search won’t reveal that anyway).

Every year on this day I tend to look at where I am with things. It’s certainly been an interesting, and very productive, year. I made the move to full-time freelance writer, and there’s been no regret on that decision. The big change for me right now, starting Monday, is that my role at Wired’s Game|Life is going to increase to what amounts to pretty much a full-time gig. This continued move into the world of game journalism is one I’m quite happy with, and that I embrace fully. That’s not to say that my links to design are getting cut, but it’s turning into an interesting expansion of my activities. Even better, I finally have an excuse for my wife when she asks about my excessive, maybe even obsessive, game playing: “It’s research, honey…”

I posted the other day about Tokyolife: Art and Design, and I’m also incredibly excited about the game book you all know I’ve been working on for Kodansha since last year. I think a lot of people are going to be very surprised by how good this thing is going to be — and that it will be of interest even to those who don’t really consider themselves to have an interest in gaming — and I can’t wait to see everyone get access to it.

So today, I’m taking things easy. I think we’ll get lunch at Rigoletto in the Shin-Marunouchi Building — I love their pizza — and then tonight it will probably be a feast at home, courtesy of Seibu’s depa-chika. Here’s looking forward to the start of another great year!

PSFK takes a look at the newly opened second MUJI store in NYC, on the ground floor of the New York Times Building.

PingMag does a bit of urban research, comparing Tokyo’s Shibuya and Marunouchi districts.

Otaku magazine’s next issue, their fourth, is titled Otaku Kaidan, and covers all things horror in Japan. From their site:

You can order the issue from the magazine’s official site. Thanks, Tim!

My weekly Tokyo post is up at MoCo Loco, this time covering Masato Tokuno’s ECO POKE MAI chopsticks, the MUJI Award 03 competition, and Jo Nagasaka‘s Long Chair.

The last item is news of Keiji‘s one-day exhibition at his studio this Friday (May 30), featuring works by Mikiya Kobayashi, who shares the space with Keiji. There will be a reception in the evening, from 19:00.

I’ve very happy to announce that today marks the official release of TOKYOLIFE: ART AND DESIGN, a beautiful new tome from Rizzoli that covers Tokyo’s creative output of the past few years. I have the great pleasure of getting a project coordination credit in the book, and hope that you get a chance to have a look or even pick it up.

The main contributors to the book are Ian Luna (author and editor of many books on architecture and design), Lauren A. Gould (art director and writer, currently working on a Bape monograph), Tom Mes and Jasper Sharp (co-editors of Japanese film site Midnight Eye), and David G. Imber and Mika Yoshida (writers for BRUTUS and CASA BRUTUS, and other magazines). The cover is by Chip Kidd, quite possibly my favorite book design (and if you haven’t, you really need to pick up CHIP KIDD: BOOK ONE).

Below, the official description for the book:

Photos from the opening of the “Glazed Paradise” exhibition at the Diesel Denim Gallery in Aoyama, featuring works by Mark Jenkins and Miho Kinomura. The show runs until August 15.

Music video for Cornelius’ “Omstart” track, directed by frequent collaborator Koichiro Tsujikawa. Via Motionographer.

My monthly column “On Design” was in yesterday’s edition of THE JAPAN TIMES, and you can read it online here. This time, I cover Mile‘s Crossing Ribbon chair, Mindscape‘s Peddy, TENDO‘s ORIZURU chair, Toshiba’s Escargot vaccum, Ingo Maurer’s TU-BE lamp (distributed in Japan by Studio NOI).

MUJI has announced details on this year’s edition of their “MUJI Award” competition. The theme for 2008 is “Found MUJI.” From the site:

The “Found MUJI” mark has been used often in exhibitions at their Atelier MUJI gallery space in Yurakucho. The entry period runs July 1-31. Via Dezain.net.

Looks like Kadokawa — the company behind the terrific THE MELANCHOLY OF HARUHI SUZUMIYA series — will be allowing some of its content to be posted on YouTube for free viewing, starting next month. Here’s a link to Kodakawa’s YouTube channel. Via Japan Probe.

Looks like artist Tenmyouya Hisashi is raking in the dough. At a Christie’s auction in Hong Kong, the Gundam painting pictured above was sold for around US$600,000. Via Kotaku.

Emori Takeaki of iconic band Citrus gets the interview treatment over at Neojaponisme. Also, listen to the Neojaponisme podcast, with David and Trevor chatting about the band, and playing a few tracks.

The Art Space Tokyo maps keep on coming, with Ginza (the gallery covered in the book is Tokyo Gallery + BTAP) now available as a downloadable PDF.