Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower
A 50-story school curved like a cocoon — white aluminum and dark-blue glass, criss-crossed by diagonal white lines — that beat 150 rival proposals and won Skyscraper of the Year.
Coming soon on iOS — be first to walk Tokyo offline.
Paul Noritaka Tange (son of Kenzo Tange) designed this 204-metre tower to act as a gateway between Shinjuku Station and the CBD. It squeezes 10,000 fashion, IT, and medical students into one vertical campus and is the second-tallest educational building on earth, surpassed only by Moscow State University's main building.
What to look for
- The curved shell of white aluminum and dark-blue glass wrapped in a web of white diagonal lines — the brief required a non-rectangular form
- Three-story student lounges punched into the facade every three floors, each facing a different direction: east, southwest, and northwest
- The cocoon silhouette from street level, designed to symbolize nurturing the students inside
Located near Shinjuku Station in the Nishi-Shinjuku district; this is a working school with no public interior access confirmed.
Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower is one of 35 sights worth the detour in Tokyo, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Tokyo pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Tokyo
- Tokyo SkytreeAt 634 metres, the height isn't random — 6-3-4 spells "Musashi," the ancient name for this exact corner of Tokyo.
- Tokyo TowerA third of its steel came from US tanks scrapped after the Korean War — Japan's postwar recovery, painted orange and bolted into the sky.
- National Diet LibraryBorn in 1948 as a "citadel of popular sovereignty," Japan's national library holds 12 million volumes — and anyone can walk in.
- Akihabara (Electric Town)The black market that outgrew itself and became Japan's otaku capital.
- Tokyo National MuseumOne in ten of every artwork Japan has ever officially designated a National Treasure lives here.
- Yasukuni ShrineKamikaze pilots swore they would "meet again at Yasukuni" — 2,466,532 names are enshrined here, fourteen of them convicted of Class A war crimes at the Tokyo Trial.