Best Pole Dancing in Tokyo for Travelers:#1 Pole Dance Tokyo
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Hi, I’m Kay and one of my favorite methods of movement nowadays is pole dancing! So…if you couldn’t already deduce from the title, I went pole dancing in Tokyo. That said, I’m…not the best at pole dancing. Or dancing in general. Or anything having to do with any kind of pole in any capacity.
Maybe that’s why I love it so much.
But among the millions of mini hobbies and interests I have, pole dancing has surprisingly been one that merges pretty well with another big interest of mine: TRAVELING. I have literally never thought of combining travel and pole dancing until we had our own traveling poler visit my home pole studio. She was visiting Portland, Oregon (from South America, but I forgot the country) for a few weeks and wanted to keep up her practice.
Granted, she spoke English fluently and was an amazing poler, but it still inspired me that she had the confidence and courage to visit a pole studio in a different country with all new people and new instructors in another language.
I, on the other hand, have incredible social anxiety and am not skilled at pole. It did however peak my interest in taking my pole journey international. When I visited Japan in 2023, we had about a week (split up at the beginning and end of the trip) in the country’s capital, so I thought it would be the perfect time to try pole dancing in Tokyo.
My Pole Journey
I should start this post off by clarifying where I am in my pole journey. I am but a weeeee baby poler. Although I’ve been off-and-on in my home studio (Iko Movement) in Portland for a little over a year, honestly, it’s been mostly off. When I’m home in Portland, I’m WORKING. Like…48-60 hour work week typa working. And with my schedule that includes working Saturdays, it makes it hard to find a consistent schedule with class availability.
I can pretty comfortably invert and do some sits and hooks, but I haven’t been able to advance much further because of my schedule, so I’m still actively working on getting cross knee/ankle releases, inverted crucifixes, and intermediate spins (like the Juliet *shakes fist). I also cannot do the splits – front or middle.
I had big dreams of pole dancing in Tokyo, but keep in mind it had been over a year since I had been in a pole class-class. I WAS RUSTY okay. I also do not speak Japanese. Also I was extremely nervous about being in a room with new people and a new instructor in a new language WHILE ALSO BEING RUSTY. I was not confident, but I was going pole dancing in Tokyo anyway.
Sometimes, you just gotta jump in.
Pole Dance Tokyo
There seemed to be a few (two or three) pole studios in Tokyo that had at least some instruction in English, but I landed on choosing Pole Dance Tokyo as my visiting studio for pole dancing in Tokyo. Aside from the extremely apt name, I chose Pole Dance Tokyo because the schedule worked out the best for our VERY packed itinerary.
Basically the only night we had free of concrete plans, Pole Dance Tokyo had an dance choreo class. Since I hadn’t been in a pole skills class in a while, I figured that a choreo class might be a nice way to ease into pole dancing in Tokyo without completely making a fool of myself.
….
Ahaha.
….
But I’m getting ahead of myself. The other studios seemed cool too, but Pole Dance Tokyo seemed to have the most classes and the widest range of classes and class times. Which makes sense because they are also the largest pole studio in Tokyo!
Established in 2006, Pole Dance Tokyo has 15 poles and 4-meter ceiling height and their instructors are literally WORLD Pole Champions. There are also bathrooms and a changing space with lockers.
The prices for pole dancing in Tokyo seemed to be around the same price for the different studios, so it really just came down to the schedule for me. At Pole Dance Tokyo, they do offer a discounted “trial class,” which is just a discount on your first class at the studio for 2,500 yen (~$17 USD in Nov 2023), and each visitor class after that is 5,500 yen (~$39 USD). Which honestly isn’t bad! You can also rent a pole for practice by yourself, and for visitors that price is 2,700 yen (~19 USD) per hour.
If you’ll be in Tokyo for a while, they also have bundle deals on classes and open pole/open aerial rental. You can easily book your class online and pay by card. The studio is open to any and all genders!
My Experience
We had just gotten into Tokyo from our 3 days in Kyoto, and we were pretty beat. After freshening up at our Ginza hotel (Grand Bach, one of the best hotels in Tokyo in my humble opinion), I grabbed a protein shake at 7-11 and made my way over to Pole Dance Tokyo.
The studio is super close to both Akasaka station and Akasakamitsuke station (under 5 min walk from either), so it made pole dancing in Tokyo super convenient. There is a sign outside that will point you down some stairs to the studio. Inside, there is a small landing where the front desk is, you can check in there and the front desk staff will alert you to the changing room where the lockers are. And the lockers do lock, so feel free to leave your wallet and whatnot in the locker.
However, if you are using a pocket Wifi (I use Keepgo), then just a heads up that the range might not reach your phone when you’re in class and your friends will be wondering where you are haha.
I quickly changed out of my baggy sweats in the room. I didn’t pack my heels or kneepads since I was trying to save space in my luggage, but luckily the studio had both available to rent. I forget the exact amount but it came out to about ~9 USD for both. I signed up for a choreography class, but it seems like most of their classes follow the same format: a thorough warm-up and stretch session, choreo, and then a nice cool down.
The instructor for the class, Eri, let us know since we were the last class of the day, we could stay and dance for as long as we wanted.
How naive I was to think I would make it that long.
The warm-up was, no joke, basically a CrossFit class. I was PANTING. It wasn’t a warm-up to pole dancing in Tokyo, it was a BLAZE UP. While it was a lot more intense than I was expecting, it also felt so good to have my muscles that warm and limber before what would become…the hardest choreography class I had ever taken. In terms of the actual choreo, in the instructor’s defense, she did ask if I had done exotic choreography before.
Technicallyyy….”Yes,” I said confidently. Technically, in the sense that I had taken exactly ONE class that mostly taught floorwork for inflexible beginners. But…like technically.
Pole dancing in Tokyo was HARD. Probably one of the hardest fitness classes I had ever…across ANY type of fitness class. I was struggling to even keep up, nevermind actually doing the move correctly. But something I appreciated is that the instructor didn’t let me slack off. Like…literally, she was ON me. Well, not literally literally, but whenever I was sloppy (which was often), she would call me on it and remind me that I can and should do better.
Even if it took hours.
And it did.
Both me and the others in the class were encouraged to keep giving 150% because if we didn’t want to improve then why try at all? We COULD AND SHOULD do better. I’m not sure if that mindset is particular to pole dancing in Tokyo culture, or the particular instructor, but it did give me another perspective to apply to pole and really any hobby.
Towards the end of the class, we each had an opportunity to dance by ourselves and *expertly* filmed by the instructor. I believe the other folks in the class stayed longer after we did our individual dances, buuuut I was SPENT so I wobbled out hahah.
Conclusion: Pole Dancing in Tokyo
Overall, I am SO SO GLAD I took the leap to try pole dancing in Tokyo, even though I was sweating from just the thought of being in a new environment doing something that I…admittedly was not the most skilled in with – the most nerve wracking of all – NEW PEOPLE. But Pole Dance Tokyo was great at being welcoming, inclusive, and encouraging to visitors wanting to try pole dancing in Tokyo during their trip.
Honestly, it was such a great experience that now I want to try pole dancing in any destination I visit if I have enough time! Have you ever tried pole? If yes, or even if no I suppose, would you try pole dancing in Tokyo? Let me know in the comments below!
Pin Pole Dancing in Tokyo for Travelers
