e Nebuta Festival is the highlight of summer in the city of Aomori and also marks the symbolic end of the short warm season in this northern region. The focal points of the festival are floats called Nebuta. These giant creations that often depict a historical event or a scene from a Kabuki performance, are illuminated from within. For the local people, companies, and organizations involved with the festival, it is the culmination of months of preparation, and a wave of excitement can be felt throughout the city as the event approaches. Along with the Sendai Tanabata and the Akita Kanto, the Nebuta Festival is one of the three major Tohoku festivals held in August and swells the city with more than 2.5 million visitors every August 2 to 7.

The Nebuta floats are pushed by participants along a three-kilometer parade course before audiences of local residents and visitors from around the country. Haneto (festival dancers) show off their moves and chant “Rassera! Rassera!” cheering on the pullers of the floats and rousing the excitement of the audience. The music of the hayashi festival musicians, who play drums, wooden flutes, and hand cymbals in the parade, reverberates along the route, while spectators enjoy festival fare from the food stalls.

The Nebuta Festival most likely originated from a mix of the Tanabata Festival, a celebration of the stars, and a Japanese custom called Nemuri Nagashi. These traditions involved releasing lanterns onto rivers or the ocean, and the original Nebuta floats developed from these lanterns. Today’s style of colossal, figure-shaped floats was established after World War II, and in 1980 the festival was designated an Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property of Japan.

The festival’s evening parades run for five days from August 2 to 6, starting at 7:10 p.m.; all 22 large Nebuta floats make an appearance on the last of those days. On August 7, the final day of the festival, events kick off with a daytime parade at 1:00 p.m. and finish with an evening Bay Parade featuring the best Nebuta floats for that year, plus a fireworks show. Preceding this six-day program, the Nebuta Eve is held on August 1 around Rasse Land, an area where finishing work on the floats is done in hangar-like tents. In addition to these tents, there are also food stalls, hayashi festival music, and the finished floats on display.

Both the namesake and stars of the festival, the Nebuta floats are gargantuan creations weighing up to 4 tons, with a maximum height of 5 meters, a width of 9 meters, and depth of 7 meters. Every year the festival features 22 Nebuta floats that take one year to make, from drafting the design to the actual construction of the figures. Aomori Prefecture has several variations of the Nebuta festival, including a prominent one in the city of Hirosaki, but the city of Aomori’s Nebuta Festival is particularly renowned for its beautiful and impressive floats.

Each float has its own distinct style but still follows the traditional Nebuta float appearance. They are handcrafted by nebutashi (Nebuta artisans), who are required to master the three core aspects of the art form: sketching, modeling, and coloring. The figures on the floats are often inspired by a historical event, a Kabuki play, or ancient folklore. All the characters have large faces with intense eyebrows and are depicted wearing colorful, sometimes dotted, clothing. Each float is lit up to contrast against the dark night sky. Some floats reproduce nature, with pastel pink cherry blossoms, or illustrate a fierce war scene in shades of vermillion.

The lit-up floats at night resemble massive, surreal creatures towering above the spectators. Each float is carried and maneuvered by a team of hikite pullers. The hikite follow instructions from the conductor, or sensumochi, who is responsible for choreographing the dynamic movements of the float and showing the audience its four sides, which are all intricately decorated in their own way.

Nebuta-shi refers to the people who create the large "Nebuta" doll lanterns that appear from August 2nd to 7th, and in recent years, Nebuta-shi have begun to be recognized as "artists." To date, seven Nebuta masters have been recognized as Nebuta masters who have achieved outstanding results, and the current Nebuta masters are Takashi Kitamura, the 6th master, and Takenami, the 7th master. There are only two people, Mr. Hiro.