The unconscious act: Why we leave our shoes at the door

“Even if the shoe fits, take it off inside the house.”

In Japan, removing our shoes when entering a building is an almost unconscious ritual, as natural to us as breathing. To be honest, I had never truly questioned why we do this until I realized how many people outside Japan are genuinely curious about the reason.

Common theories often cited include:

• The high temperature and humidity of the Japanese climate.
• A unique culture of dividing the world into in-group (uchi) and out-group (soto).
• The ancient tradition of sleeping directly on the floor.

The first reason is weak; many humid Asian countries don’t strictly adhere to this rule. The second, while philosophically interesting, feels too remote. The third reason, however, stimulated my intellectual curiosity the most: We take off our shoes to keep the floor clean because we traditionally sleep on it. This simple, practical logic led me to the next question: Why did we start sleeping on the floor in the first place?

The simple truth: Wood, climate, and space efficiency

The reason we sleep on a Japanese futon directly on the floor (tatami) is rooted in two everlasting truths about Japan: its geography and its architecture.

1. Wood and Warmth: As I wrote previously, about 70% of Japan’s land consists of forest. We’ve always had abundant wood to build houses. Crucially, wooden houses are warmer and softer underfoot than the stone or masonry structures common elsewhere. This made the floor a comfortable, viable sleeping surface, eliminating the immediate necessity for beds.
2. Space Efficiency: Spreading out and folding up futons is far more space-efficient than placing large, permanent beds. In a country where land is scarce and houses are relatively small—a direct consequence of being a forest-covered, mountainous archipelago—space-efficiency has always been highly prioritized.

The logical chain is simple: Abundant Wood $\rightarrow$ Comfortable Floors –> Futons –> Need for a Clean Sleeping Surface –> No-Shoe Culture.

The unintended consequence: Lower furniture standards

The true cultural impact of this “No-Shoe” tradition affects everything we design. Because our bodies and eyes are accustomed to being closer to the ground (sitting on tatami, sleeping on the floor), our standard heights for chairs and tables are naturally slightly lower than the global standard.

We often propose that our customers, even those abroad, try this cultural experiment: Take off your shoes and try our chairs and tables in our shops. You may discover that the subtle, lower height feels surprisingly calming and comfortable. You don’t have to adopt a no-shoe policy at home, of course; we offer global standard heights in all our collections.

Ultimately, when you buy a Japanese chair, you are buying furniture whose proportions were dictated by the floor on which a great Shogun (or a salaryman exhausted from the Tokyo commute) once sat.

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