I have a piece in this week’s issue of TIME (Vol. 171, No. 3, Asian edition), which you can read online here. It’s on Swatch Japan’s HQ in Ginza, the Nicolas G. Hayek Center.

From the high-tech Nicolas G. Hayek Center in Ginza, Shigeru Ban’s Carboard Bridge is made of, well, cardboard. Via Archinect.

I got a new camera today. My old one, a Canon PowerShot A95, had been giving me trouble for about a month now, often times not responding properly, and it finally stopped working completely a couple of days ago — the real sad thing is that I only realized it as I was being given a tour of Swatch Group Japan’s Nicolas G. Hayek Center in Ginza by one of the architects who contributed to the project, Keiji Ashizawa, including views from the top.

After doing some research, I settled on the new Canon IXY Digital 810 IS (the Japanese version of the Canon PowerShot SD850 IS). For a while I’d been thinking that my next camera would be a Lumix, especially for the Leica lens, but the Canon I ended up getting kept showing up highly recommended on review sites, and it seemed to offer all of the features I wanted. When I last bought a camera, I wanted something that offered a lot of manual functionality, but over the 2 and half years that I used the A95, I noticed that I pretty much never used the aperture or shutter speed controls. The only thing I’m really going to miss from my A95 was the LCD that you could flip open, which is how I always took shots. Surprisingly, Canon has eliminated that feature from the entire PowerShot line (only some of the more expensive prosumer models have it).

One of the nicest surprises is that this new camera can act as a great voice recorder, with no limit on length (just the size of your memory card). I tested it quickly, and it’s so much better than what I experienced with the iPod and iTalk combo, which means I might just start doing some Tokyo Boy podcasts again.

Another great feature I’ve been having a lot of fun with is the photostitch mode. What you see at the top of this post, a section of Kanda River, can be better viewed here.

The other day I passed by Swatch Group Japan’s new Nicolas G. Hayek Center in Ginza, with a design headed by Shigeru Ban. I was in a hurry, so only had time to snap a few shots. The elevators — each one also acts as a showroom, and connects to one of the 7 stores — are rather cool, and I am looking forward to events at the exhibition space on the top floor. I wrote about the building for Gridskipper here.

• Nicolas G. Hayek Center
• The Lockup

You can read all of my Gridskipper posts here (or even subscribe to a feed).

I’m surprised I missed this — I was even in Ginza yesterday for one of my gallery tours — but Swatch Group Japan’s Nicolas G. Hayek Center (7-9-18 Ginza), designed by Shigeru Ban, is now open. The photo above comes from this TimeZone post, which includes a few more shots of the building.