“Love hotels are a unique and deeply ingrained part of Japanese culture,” says photographer François Prost. “These venues have a very ‘talkative’ quality visually—they’re expressive in their design, reflecting aspects of local culture, values, and even fantasies.”
During a trip to Japan in 2023, when Prost was exhibiting an earlier series of works called Gentlemen’s Club at a gallery in Tokyo, he embarked on a road trip from the capital city to Shikoku Island in the southeast of the country. With the gallery’s urging, he undertook a new project while visiting, documenting the facades of love hotels—also sometimes called “boutique” or “fashion” hotels—that offer rooms at cheap rates for brief stays.
Prost, who is based in Lyon, France, approaches his subjects as features of the landscape that characterize a specific vernacular and highlight quirky or taboo facets of local culture. Gentleman’s Club, for example, documented American strip clubs along a southerly route from Miami to Los Angeles in 2019. He has also sought out Ivorian, French, and Spanish nightclubs in series like After Party and discoteca.
“I choose specific types of venues in each country—those with distinct, often kitschy or roadside architecture—and photograph them across the region with a consistent framing style,” Prost says. “I’m drawn to the aesthetic of these places, and how their facades reveal something about the people who inhabit or frequent them.”
His latest series, Love Hotel, captures the unmissably colorful designs of roadside lodging, ranging from ships and castles to flowers and a pink whale. “The venues aim to evoke a sense of romance, escape, and fantasy, yet they also need to feel safe and inviting—not tacky or sordid,” Prost says. “It’s why some of these places have an almost ‘Disney-like’ aesthetic, playful yet carefully curated.” Estimates of how many love hotels dot Japan range from 10,000 to 40,000.
Prost has launched a new book for the series on Kickstarter that highlights the creativity and occasional hilarity of these infamous destinations. “I hope viewers are struck by the incredible attention to detail and devotion to design that defines these spaces in Japan,” Prost says.
You can support the book on Kickstarter until January 10, and stay updated by following Prost on Instagram. Explore all of his projects, including more books, on his website.
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