Hagoita-ichi: Asakusa's December market of decorated paddles

For three days every December, the grounds of Sensō-ji in Asakusa turn into a wall of paddles. Courtesans and kabuki actors in padded fabric look out from stalls lit by bare bulbs, some no longer than your hand, some taller than you. This is hagoita-ichi (羽子板市), the battledore market. Unlike tori-no-ichi, whose dates wander around November, it never moves: 17 to 19 December, every year. In 2026 that is Thursday to Saturday. The one detail that does change is the opening hours, and those had not been published for 2026 when this was written.

17–19 December, and the hours to check

The dates come from Kannon, the bodhisattva Sensō-ji is built around. The 18th of every month is Kannon's ennichi (縁日), a day of special connection, and Sensō-ji calls the one on 18 December osame-no-kannon (納めの観音), the last Kannon day of the year. The market sits on either side of it, from the 17th to the 19th, so there is nothing to look up except the weekday.

Hours are the part to confirm. GO TOKYO, Tokyo's official tourism site, listed the 2025 market as 9:00 to 19:30, closing at 19:00 on the last day. When this guide was checked on 6 October 2026, neither GO TOKYO nor Sensō-ji had posted hours for 2026. Plan around the 2025 pattern, then check again in December.

From Edo's year-end fair to the paddle market

Sensō-ji tells the story on its own site. In the Edo period, merchants counted on the crowds who came for Kannon's day on 17 and 18 December, and set up stalls in the temple grounds selling New Year goods and lucky charms. The fair came to be called toshi-no-ichi (歳の市), the year-end market. From around the end of the Edo period, more and more of those stalls sold hagoita.

GO TOKYO fills in the rest: the name hagoita-ichi had settled by the middle of the Shōwa era, and the market has run for about 360 years without a break, through the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake and the Second World War. Japanese listings still use both names together, as 歳の市（羽子板市）.

What you're looking at: oshie hagoita

A hagoita (羽子板) is the paddle for hanetsuki (羽根つき), a New Year game like badminton without a net. The ones at this market are not for playing. They are oshie hagoita (押絵羽子板): pictures built from card shapes wrapped in cotton and fabric, layered so that faces, hair and sleeves stand up off the board. Saitama Prefecture, whose Kasukabe workshops make them, dates the first oshie paddles to the Bunka and Bunsei years (1804–1830), and notes that the padded figure and the painted face are made by different specialists.

The usual subjects are kabuki actors in famous roles and women in elaborate kimono. The numbers are what surprise people. GO TOKYO put the 2025 display at around 10,000 Edo oshie hagoita, from 15 cm to about 2 m. Edo oshie (江戸押絵) is a nationally designated traditional craft, and the 2025 market had stalls for more than 20 kinds of designated crafts, with craftspeople demonstrating their work.

Why a paddle is a lucky charm

GO TOKYO gives the shape as the reason. A hagoita widens towards the top like the slopes of Mount Fuji, a form called suehirogari (末広がり) that reads as fortune spreading outwards, so since the Edo period it has been kept as a charm for children and grandchildren to prosper and to ward off bad luck. Sensō-ji's page explains the shuttlecock as well. The feathered hane looks like a dragonfly, and dragonflies eat insects, so the hane "eats" the bad bugs that bring illness. The bead at its tip is called a mame (bean), a pun on mame ni kurasu, living in good health.

Photos: A display hagoita in its glass case, the way households set one out for the New Year — katorisi, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons · A battledore and shuttlecock in a surimono print by Kikugawa Eishin, 1810s — Kikugawa Eishin (poems: Hōrai Kanemaru), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

That is why a paddle is a baby present. The doll maker Kyūgetsu describes the custom: a decorated hagoita is given to a girl for her first New Year (初正月, hatsu-shōgatsu), with the wish that she grows up without misfortune or illness. Boys get a hamayumi (破魔弓), a ceremonial bow for breaking evil, a custom Kyūgetsu dates to the Edo period. GO TOKYO adds that from the Edo period to the Taishō era, kabuki-actor paddles were sent as year-end gifts to households with children.

Before you buy one

None of the official pages checked for this guide publishes prices, and with paddles running from palm-sized to two metres, the range is wide. Ask at the stall. A few practical points:

• Think about the flight home. Many display paddles come mounted in glass cases. The small boxed paddles laid out on the front tables are the realistic buy if you are carrying one back in a suitcase.
• Look past the paddles. Stalls also sell other New Year goods. In the photo above, a stall has set out Imado-ware beckoning cats next to its paddles.
• Old paddles have a send-off. The market includes a hagoita kuyō (羽子板供養), a memorial service for retired paddles. In 2025, GO TOKYO listed registration as 10:00–17:00, until 14:30 on the last day. Details such as any fee were not published, so ask on the day.

Getting there

The market fills the grounds of Sensō-ji, 2-3-1 Asakusa, Taitō City. The nearest station is Asakusa, on the Tokyo Metro Ginza Line, the Toei Asakusa Line, the Tobu Skytree Line and the Tsukuba Express. There is no ticket: the stalls stand inside a working temple, and none of the official pages lists an admission charge. You pay for what you buy.

If you are staying overnight for an evening visit, Asakusa itself is the easiest base. The walk from the station to the stalls is a few minutes.

The Japanese you'll actually use

These are the words on the stall banners and Sensō-ji's notices, plus the two questions you will need at the counter.

Want these to stick? The free JLPT battle quiz drills travel and culture vocabulary like this with spaced repetition.