The Shibuya Scramble is the most photographed pedestrian crossing in the world, and from the second-floor observation point of the Starbucks above it, or from the rooftop of the Shibuya Sky tower, it is genuinely impressive to watch several hundred people cross simultaneously from all directions and not collide. The surrounding blocks are Shibuya 109 and the department stores and the flagship fashion retail that makes Shibuya the commercial centre for Tokyo's youth fashion industry. It is a lot. The correct amount of time to spend in the middle of it is two to three hours.
Harajuku, the neighbourhood immediately north of Shibuya, is divided between Takeshita Street, which is the teen fashion market compressed into a single pedestrianised alley, and Omotesando, which is the luxury retail boulevard that runs parallel and contains the flagship stores of most major European fashion houses in buildings by Kengo Kuma, Tadao Ando, and Herzog and de Meuron. Both streets are worth an hour. The neighbourhood between them, the side streets off Omotesando, is where the interesting independent fashion is.
Meiji Jingu, the Shinto shrine dedicated to Emperor Meiji, sits inside seventy hectares of forested land in the middle of this neighbourhood, and entering it from the Harajuku gate involves walking a ten-minute path through forest before you reach the shrine itself. The contrast with what is outside the gate is total.
Anyone who wants to understand Tokyo's relationship with fashion, youth culture, and the urban scale of consumer desire. People who want the Scramble photograph and the experience of standing in it. Visitors who want to alternate between commercial Tokyo and forested Tokyo in the same afternoon.
Not the right area for anyone who finds crowds genuinely distressing. Shibuya on a Saturday afternoon is one of the densest pedestrian experiences in the world. Meiji Jingu on those same days is crowded in its own way; weekday mornings are the correct time.
Meiji Jingu on a weekday morning, ideally before the shrine opens at sunrise. The Shibuya Scramble from above: Shibuya Sky, open until 11pm, or the Starbucks window on the second floor for a simpler option. Omotesando for the architecture: the Prada store by Herzog and de Meuron, the Omotesando Hills complex by Tadao Ando, the TOD's building by Toyo Ito. The side streets between Omotesando and Takeshita for the independent fashion that is not in the flagship stores. Daikanyama is a ten-minute walk south of Shibuya and is the correct place to go when Shibuya has been enough.