Tamtam Hobby Shop — Local services in Tokyo

My gosh, where do I begin. This place is a hobbyists' dreamland. And especially if you either love constructing miniature designs or love trains or are into collecting rare miniatures of classic car/train/airplane models; this is THE place for you.

It's easy to kill off 2-3 hours at this place, especially when you see such realistic miniature train engines with motors running on tracks controlled by you.

Special mentions for the friendly staff. They go out of their way to help you with enquires even though they don't speak much English.

It's on the 4th and 5th floor. But majority of the scaled train models are on the 5th flr. As far as I could understand, there were 3 major brands that sell these models namely Tomix, Kato and Greenmax. Kato on average was a bit expensive than Tomix,but nevertheless the starting range for either is quite...

I came all the way from America ready to spend 30,000 yen to purchase a few Kato train models. I walked out the door buying nothing. Previous reviews are true - terrible customs service. I used my translation app and asked that AFTER I buy the train can you test it to make sure it works before I take it home. The answer was not today but maybe next week. Either the staff is incompetent or rude to foreigners or both. I saw one Japanese customer being allowed to use a magnifying glass to inspect a train model. I don’t think this is a case of lost in translation. Foreigners are not...

Tamtam is great for picking up gunpla and other model kits at a fair bit below the MSRP. You can save hundreds of yen on many kits compared to large flagship stores. The store itself is well kept and spread over two floors, each with a different focus. The staff is helpful and always on hand. The only reason I am rating four instead of five is that the store is very much "what you see is what you get"; they do not keep stock anywhere but the shelves, so if you are unlucky someone else will already have grabbed what you are looking for. Still, a strong four...