At Jingumae Crossing in Harajuku, Laforet Harajuku stands out with its distinctive cylindrical facade. Now, that exterior has been transformed into a scene that makes the building itself appear almost like a giant piece of playground equipment.

The 2026 Autumn/Winter advertising visual for Laforet Harajuku was created by Masaki Hanahara of SOAR NY, a graphic designer and visual artist based in Brooklyn, New York. The visual concept is titled “LAFORET THE PLAYGROUND.”

Courtesy of SOAR NY

Black-and-white photographs shot in a Brooklyn park are layered with vivid graphics in pink, red, and blue. The model hangs from playground equipment, slides down a slide, and moves through the space with the abandon of a child at play.

Once the visual is installed on the exterior of Laforet Harajuku, the curves of the playground equipment in the photograph appear to connect with the building’s rounded facade. The idea goes beyond placing an advertisement on architecture; the architecture itself becomes part of the graphic composition.

Reimagining Laforet Harajuku as a “PLAYGROUND”

At the outset of the project, Hanahara began by asking a fundamental question: what kind of place is Laforet Harajuku?

Courtesy of SOAR NY

From Lolita to street style and high fashion, styles coexist without being confined to a single category. Hanahara sees this as “a certain kind of chaos” that fits naturally with Harajuku itself.

"I think Laforet Harajuku is a place people come to in search of their own form of expression."

That idea led to the concept of “LAFORET THE PLAYGROUND.”

A playground is a place where people can lose themselves in what they are doing, like children, and one that is open to everyone. Hanahara also saw potential in the contrast of adults in effortlessly stylish looks genuinely throwing themselves into play in a children’s playground—something he felt could become a distinctly Laforet expression of fashion.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

Rather than presenting fashion as a finished style to be admired, the campaign treats it as something to enjoy, play with, and use as a form of self-expression. This vision of Laforet Harajuku as “a place to search for your own expression, a place to become completely absorbed” is translated here into the universally intuitive image of a “PLAYGROUND.”

Shooting a Harajuku Visual in Brooklyn

One of the most striking aspects of the campaign is that a visual created for Laforet Harajuku was photographed not in Tokyo, but in New York.

The location was an actual park in Brooklyn. From the beginning, Hanahara wanted to shoot in a real playground rather than recreate one in a studio.

"If we built the set in a studio, I felt that the expressions and movements of the body might lose their sense of reality."

Hanging, climbing, sliding—the movement that emerges as the model’s body comes into contact with real playground equipment becomes part of the visual language itself.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

Another reason Brooklyn mattered was the color and form of New York playground equipment. Compared with Japan, the structures tend to be more colorful and distinctive in shape.

Harajuku itself has developed a distinctive culture by bringing together a wide range of different elements. By layering elements of New York onto Laforet Harajuku, Hanahara hoped to create “an even more chaotic, more Harajuku-like landscape.”

Instead of depicting Harajuku directly within Tokyo, the campaign looks at it once through New York. That distance introduces a different rhythm into a familiar view of Laforet Harajuku.

Turning Cylindrical Architecture into a Giant Piece of Playground Equipment

The exterior billboard expresses the idea of “LAFORET THE PLAYGROUND” most clearly.

Laforet Harajuku is defined by its cylindrical facade, and advertising displayed along its curved surface behaves very differently from a conventional flat billboard.

As the project developed, Hanahara became increasingly interested in that unusual architectural condition.

"I started wondering whether we could turn the fact that the visual would not be displayed flat into an advantage."

His solution was to connect the building with the monkey bars seen in the playground.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

In the photograph shot in Brooklyn, the model hangs from the structure. By aligning the line of the monkey bars with the cylindrical architecture of Laforet Harajuku, the building itself begins to resemble an enormous piece of playground equipment, making it appear as though the model is playing high above the streets of Harajuku.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

The curvature of the facade, the line of the playground equipment, and the model’s body are conceived as a continuous composition.

Here, architecture is not simply a background on which an advertisement is placed. The building itself becomes one of the materials that makes “LAFORET THE PLAYGROUND” possible.

Designing from the Viewpoint of Jingumae Crossing, Not a Computer Screen

Another defining aspect of the campaign is the question of where, and how, the image will actually be seen.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

Laforet Harajuku sits at Jingumae Crossing, where Meiji-dori and Omotesando meet. The exterior visual naturally catches the eye of pedestrians, people waiting at the traffic lights, and visitors to Harajuku.

For Hanahara, that meant the design had to communicate instinctively rather than require explanation.

"People of many different generations and nationalities pass through this area, so I felt it needed to communicate intuitively rather than descriptively."

The viewing angle was equally important. An exterior billboard is not seen straight on, as it might appear on a computer screen during the design process. Pedestrians experience it from below, looking sharply upward.

To test that difference, Hanahara printed reduced versions of the design, held them up, and repeatedly viewed them from below.

"I repeated that process again and again, searching for the angle where the playground equipment and the building would synchronize."

Rather than completing the graphic only within the screen, Hanahara incorporated the viewpoint of people actually walking through Harajuku into the design process.

It is a graphic that only truly becomes complete once it enters the city.

Seeing Laforet Harajuku Differently from New York

Now based in New York, Hanahara says that Laforet Harajuku was once simply part of his everyday landscape when he lived in Tokyo.

Distance, however, changed the way he saw it.

"I think it is quite rare for a single building to continue serving as a place that embraces younger generations for decades."

Hanahara believes that Harajuku may also be familiar to New Yorkers as a place where iconic forms of Japanese youth fashion emerge. Within that context, he sees Laforet Harajuku as a place that has long played a central role.

Looking again from New York at a landscape that once felt ordinary in Tokyo has given him a different perspective.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

The project therefore connects more than a Brooklyn park with Harajuku. It also reflects Hanahara’s own renewed understanding of Laforet Harajuku, shaped by the distance between himself and Tokyo.

Layering His Own Graphic onto a Place He Once Admired

For Hanahara, Laforet Harajuku was also a place he had admired since the early days of his career.

Courtesy of SOAR NY

Over the years, many creators have developed advertising expressions for Laforet Harajuku, and that accumulation has helped shape the image of the building itself.

Speaking about adding his own visual to that history, Hanahara describes feeling both joy and tension. For this campaign, what he wanted above all was to create something “full of energy.”

"When people walking through Harajuku look up at it, I hope it makes them feel more positive about enjoying fashion freely."

A body at play in a Brooklyn park becomes a graphic, travels to Tokyo, and overlaps with the cylindrical architecture of Laforet Harajuku. What emerges is neither simply a New York playground nor simply a Tokyo building, but a new kind of “PLAYGROUND.”

City and architecture, fashion and graphic design, and even the gaze of the people moving through the streets are brought into a single expression.

“LAFORET THE PLAYGROUND” uses the architecture of Laforet Harajuku itself to create a new “playground” within the cityscape of Harajuku.