Ni-Tele Really Big Clock Audio Guide

Ni-Tele Really Big Clock: what does the audio guide cover?

1. 01

   Welcome to Ni-Tele Really Big Clock

   Look up, because this is a clock that refuses to behave like one. You are in the Shiodome district of Minato Ward in Tokyo, beside the Nittele Tower, the headquarters of Nippon Television. Hanging outside the second story of the tower is the Ni-Tele Really Big Clock, known in Japanese as Nittere Odokei. This is a clock and a sculpture at once, designed by Hayao Miyazaki, the animator and co-founder of Studio Ghibli. Most of the day it looks like a vast, intricate piece of metalwork. Then, a few times a day, it wakes up, spinning, whirring and clanking through a short performance. Over the next few minutes we will look at who dreamed it up, what it is made of, and how to catch it in action. The tale here is about the clock itself, a free public spectacle in the middle of a business district.

2. 02

   A Miyazaki Machine

   The mind behind this timepiece is Hayao Miyazaki, best known as a legendary anime creator and a co-founder of Studio Ghibli. Here he turned his imagination from the screen into metal, and you can feel it. The clock is full of the kind of fantastical machinery that fans of his films will recognize in spirit. Travel writers often call it steampunk. That term describes a world of imagined steam-powered contraptions, the sort of thing found in science fiction and alternate history. Another magazine once described it as a vaudeville, cuckoo clock, steampunk, Victorian curio cabinet of a timepiece, which is a wonderful mouthful and a fair summary. That is the charm of the place. It is not a sleek digital display telling you the time. It is a theatrical, slightly mad machine that makes you stop on the pavement and stare.

3. 03

   Copper, Steel and Thirty-Two Moving Parts

   Now let us talk about the build. The whole structure is made entirely of hand-worked copper and steel plates. Nothing here is molded plastic or painted fiberglass. It is metal, shaped by hand, and that is why it has such a weighty, workshop-made look. The scale is impressive. The clock is described as 12 meters tall and 18 meters long, a mechanical sculpture that spreads across the face of the building rather than sitting politely on it. Some accounts give slightly different figures for its height and weight, but all agree on the same thing: it is enormous. And it is not one big gesture. It contains 32 separate moving mechanical features, each with its own motion. When the performance starts, those parts work together like a small orchestra of gears and cranks, each playing its own role in the same noisy, delightful piece.

4. 04

   Catching the Show

   The performance lasts about three minutes, and it happens only a few times a day. On weekdays it runs four times, and on Saturdays and Sundays there is an extra show, making five. Each performance begins about four minutes before the hour, so arrive a little early and let your eyes settle on the details. The clock sits two levels above street level, in front of the Nittele Tower, and you can see it from many spots around the building. Even so, the advice is to get as close as you can, because the detail is the real reward. The clock is also close to Shiodome and Shimbashi stations, so it is easy to fit into a walk through the area. Here is a curious extra. If you know where to look, you can even spot the clock from the Yurikamome trains as they glide through Shiodome. Watching it is free, with no ticket required.

5. 05

   Before You Head Off

   Once the last gear settles and the machine falls still, take a moment to notice how it sits against the glass and steel of Shiodome. A hand-worked copper fantasy hangs above the modern city, and that contrast is half the fun. If you have time, try seeing it from a different angle. Watch once from up close to study the moving figures and mechanisms, then step back and see how the whole sculpture reads from a distance. Look at how the copper and steel catch the light, and picture the 32 moving features working together. And if you are a fan of Miyazaki's worlds, ask yourself which parts of this clock feel like they came straight from one of his imagined machines. There is always another detail waiting to be spotted.