1974–the present: Azabudai

A special dedication ceremony on December 9, 1974 preceded a gala ceremony and reception on January 25 the following year to celebrate the opening of the new Club. US Ambassador to Japan James D Hodgson attended the January gathering, and there were efforts to have former President Gerald Ford come as well. Hodgson called the new Club a “handsome addition to the Tokyo landscape” in a letter published in The Tokyo American, the Club’s monthly publication at the time.

The new and prestigious facility attracted many more applications for Membership from Japanese and non-American foreigners as well as Americans. The Club would continue to carry out its mission to improve international relations and promote cultural exchange between the US and Japan.

In 1975, the Boy Scout Troop 51 started at the new Club, growing from 10 to 18 members in its first year. Also, movies on video became so popular that a video club that would evolve into the current Video Library was started. During the Vietnam War years, the Club hosted entertainment events for American troops.

The 2002 renovation of the Recreation Building was carried out partly in reaction to a 1996 survey that highlighted Members’ dissatisfaction with some elements of the Club, including the lack of parking, inadequate facilities for families and an uncomfortable mix of casual and formal spaces. The next year, the Club reactivated its Long Range Planning Committee, putting itself on the path to its current redevelopment plan.

In a special vote in May 2006, 93 percent of the Membership cast ballots in favor of the LRPC’s redevelopment proposal to move the Club to a temporary off-site location while the new premises were being built.

The Club held a groundbreaking on May 9, 2007 at its site in Takanawa, where it is set to move into a temporary facility by 2008 before returning to completely rebuilt facilities in Azabudai sometime in 2010. Echoing a ceremony before the rebuilding at Azabudai in the early 1970s, a Shinto priest conducted a purification ritual at Takanawa. World-renowned architectural firm Pelli Clarke Pelli—the company behind the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur—is designing the new Club at Azabudai.