Niihama, Ehime

Copper ore moved through these mountains for nearly three centuries, and the weight of that industry still sits in Niihama's streets. The Besshi copper mine, opened in the Genroku era under Sumitomo interests, shaped not just this city but the financial architecture of modern Japan. Remnants of that history surface at Maintopia Besshi, where visitors can walk into preserved mine tunnels, and at the Hirose Historical Memorial Museum, which holds the life and records of Sumitomo administrator Hirose Saihei alongside the gardens of his old residence.

The city's flatland runs north to the Hiuchi Sea, while the Shikoku mountains rise steeply to the south — a geography that keeps Niihama feeling compressed between industry and wilderness. Higashi Akaishi-yama stands at the far edge of that range, a destination for those willing to climb. Closer in, the Besshi Line follows the Kokuryō River upstream through a gorge where stone bridges and industrial ruins appear between the trees, the landscape half-natural, half-engineered.

In October, the Niihama Taiko Festival breaks the city's industrial calm with taiko drum floats carried through the streets — one of the three great festivals of Shikoku, and a moment when the city's character shifts visibly. Daily life carries its own quieter markers: Besshi-ame candy, zan-ki fried chicken eaten without ceremony, Hatada kuri tart in a box at the station. These are not curated souvenirs but the ordinary texture of a working city that has been producing things, in one form or another, for a very long time.