Hanazono Room
| Sun Mall Crest | |
|---|---|
San Mōru Kuresuto | |
 Sun Mall Crest in Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, where the Hanazono Room is located at the top floor | |
 | |
| Alternative names |
|
| General information | |
| Status | Completed |
| Type | Mixed-use |
| Address | Hanazono-dori Road, 1-19-10 Shinjuku, Shinjuku District |
| Town or city | Tokyo |
| Country | Japan |
| Coordinates | 35°41′22.6″N 139°42′46.7″E / 35.689611°N 139.712972°E |
| Opened | 1988 |
| Owner | Sun Mall Crest |
| Dimensions | |
| Other dimensions | Penthouse floor area: 614 m2 (6,610 sq ft; 186 tsubo) |
| Technical details | |
| Floor count | 10 |
| Known for | Pornographic film production, modeling photos |
Hanazono Room (Japanese: はなぞのルーム), officially No. 136 Hanazono Room, is an apartment room with an indoor swimming pool located in the uppermost floor of the Sun Mall Crest condominium in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. Operated by P-Studio,[1] the room is an infamous filming location for many pornographic videos with themes of aquaphilia and poolside intercourse.[2] Due to its frequent association with Japanese pornography, Hanazono Room and its pool became popularly known as "The Pool" (例のプール, Rei no Pūru, "the one pool") or "That Pool" (あのプール, Ano Pūru) in internet subcultures.[3][4]
Location
[edit]Sun Mall Crest is located on Hanazono-dori (Hanazono Road), at the address 1-19-10 Shinjuku.[5] It is across the street from Hanazono Elementary School and is accessible from Shinjuku-gyoemmae Station.
History
[edit]Although the Sun Mall Crest building was built and completed in 1988,[5] the No. 136 Hanazono Room and its leisure pool were actually built sometime around the year 2000, when Japan was recovering from the effects of the asset price bubble burst in the 1990s. It became an apartment unit for actor Kōji Ishizaka,[3] although he claimed that he lived just a floor below and the room actually belonged to another actor, Kon Ichikawa. Both actors have long since moved out of their units (Ichikawa died in 2008).
At some point following their tenancies, P-Studio acquired the room and began renting it out to studio firms nearby. Due to its proximity to Japanese gravure and pornographic studios, and owing to their smaller budgets resulting in limited choices for shooting locations, beginning in 2004[6] and by the mid- and late 2000s the indoor pool at Hanazono Room became frequently used as background for swimsuit modeling photo shoots and low-budget pornographic films.[7]
With stills from pornographic films of the Hanazono Room pool being circulated around the Japanese internet by the late 2000s, it became known as "that pool" or "the pool" in Japanese internet circles, particularly 2ch and Niconico.[7] Not long after, news outlets also began referring to the pool as "that pool".[8] As the pool became popular in local media, P-Studio itself eventually began referring to it as "The Pool". At some time during 2011, several segments from the tokusatsu drama Kamen Rider Fourze also featured the pool, resulting in it garnering even more fame.[3] With the massive spread of Japanese pornographic films on the internet from the early 2010s, "The Pool" earned a global following and became a well-known internet meme and gag, as parts of the global internet community gradually familiarized themselves with the Hanazono Room's unique layout in relation to its cult-like status on the web, specifically regarding Japanese pornography.[3]
After almost two decades of pornographic filming, on August 11, 2020, pornographic studios stopped using the Hanazono Room pool, deeming it to be "virtually prohibited" for adult video shoots. This was after P-Studio announced that they would drastically increase the operating and maintenance fees for the pool due to the need to disinfect it of "bodily fluids" from pornographic shoots, placing the operating expenses out of reach for pornographic studios. However, the pool is still being used for gravure modelling photo shoots and promotional trailers of pornographic films not otherwise taking place in the pool.[2]
See also
[edit]- Pornography in Japan
- Chronology of adult videos in Japan
- San Francisco Armory, another pornographic filming site
References
[edit]- ^ "No.136 Hanazono Room「例のプール」 - ピースタジオ CM・ドラマ・映画・グラビア・ロケの撮影スタジオ". pstudio (in Japanese). 2017-01-05. Retrieved 2025-04-07.
- ^ a b jmsorry. "THE Legendary Swimming Pool Is Now Closed for JAV Shoots". Zenra. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
- ^ a b c d Ashcraft, Brian. "The Most Infamous Swimming Pool in Japanese Pornography". Kotaku. Retrieved 11 February 2014.
- ^ "「例のプールで撮影会」「マグロ解体ショー」「神崎かおりオフ会」――ニコニコ感謝祭のプレゼントがカオス". ねとらぼ (in Japanese). Retrieved 2025-04-07.
- ^ a b Prosser, Mark (2020-05-12). "Sunmall Crest | Housing Japan". Retrieved 2025-04-07.
- ^ 例のプール / Example Pool. Aspect Co. Ltd. 2013. pp. 60–62. ISBN 9784757222755.
- ^ a b 例のプール / Example Pool. Aspect Co. Ltd. 2013. p. 19. ISBN 9784757222755.
- ^ “あのプール”で恵比寿マスカッツのTシャツに水鉄砲を噴射してきた!! I sprayed water from a water gun on the T-shirts of Ebisu Muscats at "that pool"!