Why it looks like this

When Japan ended its isolation, it chose this obscure village on Tokyo Bay for the foreigners' port — close to the capital's road, but safely apart. The treaty settlement of 1859 was laid out as a small grid by the water ('Kannai' means inside the barrier), with Japan's first gaslights, newspapers and railway (to Tokyo, 1872) arriving here first.

The city burned in the 1923 earthquake and again in 1945, rebuilding each time around the same port. Its newest quarter continues the tradition of made land: Minato Mirai's towers stand on former shipyards and reclaimed harbour.