At PLAY! MUSEUM in Tachikawa, Tokyo, a daring exhibition titled “ONE PIECE ONLY” is breaking the mold. While you might expect a showcase of iconic ONE PIECE scenes, original artwork, and themed café delights, this exhibit offers something far more unexpected. It immerses visitors in the monumental journey behind the scenes of manga creation, from the artist’s sketches to the lesser-known stages of printing, binding, and transforming a weekly serialization into a beloved comic book. Rather than focusing on the world of ONE PIECE, this exhibition celebrates the unseen labor that brings the adventure to life — a tribute to the crew who made it possible. It’s not just about manga; it’s about the voyage itself.
© Eiichiro Oda / Shueisha Inc.
INDEX
INDEX
A Grand Scroll Unfolds: Every Page of ONE PIECE on Display
The exhibition begins with the overwhelming presence of “The Wall.” This massive display features every page from ONE PIECE volumes 1 to 109, meticulously arranged across the wall. Starting from the entrance and curving dramatically through the space, it stretches approximately 3.6 meters high and 140 meters long, leading all the way to the merchandise section—an uninterrupted scroll of art.
If you look closely, you’ll notice that this “The Wall” is made up of actual pages from the commercial manga, carefully taken apart and pasted one by one. Instead of simply printing the archive data from Shueisha’s collection, eight staff members spent about a month putting it all together. According to Masashi Okamoto, the curator of the exhibition and producer of “Shueisha Manga Art Heritage,” “I thought it would be more interesting to have the same physical pages that you all own.” Indeed, the familiar texture of the paper and the smell of the ink strongly personalize the experience of this exhibition. For those who own the entire set of ONE PIECE, this is like having your own universe at home.
