ROKU KYOTO — Luxury Hotel Brand Film
ROKU KYOTO, LXR Hotels & Resorts, is Hilton's luxury resort in the foothills of northern Kyoto. When it needed its first brand film, design agency Moriya Design Studio commissioned us to plan and produce it. This luxury hotel video production in Kyoto moves from the resort's private onsen baths to the grounds of one of the city's most famous Zen temples. We handled location scouting, storyboarding, creative planning, casting, the shoot and all post-production.
The brief
The film had to introduce a new kind of Kyoto stay: a luxury resort set among the temples, gardens and mountains of the old capital. Moriya Design Studio oversaw the project. Inside that framework we did the creative planning, then shared the storyboard, casting and styling choices with the studio. Their feedback shaped each round. It was a true creative collaboration.
How we produced it
We filmed over three days: two days with a model, and one day around the resort with the hotel's own staff. Inside the hotel we filmed guest rooms with private onsen baths, the spa, the restaurant, the gardens and the outdoor thermal pool. It looks like a swimming pool, but it is a natural onsen.
Beyond the hotel, our fixing team secured permission to film at Ryoan-ji, the Zen temple known worldwide for its rock garden and part of Kyoto's UNESCO World Heritage listing. Filming permission there is very rarely granted. We also filmed a monk performing his rituals at a second local temple. With the required permission in place, we flew a drone over the resort and the mountains around it.
The crew was small and nimble: director/DOP Andrew Goldie, a producer, a camera assistant, a lighting assistant, a stylist and a hair and make-up artist, with a location van and driver. We keep teams like this lean and draw on our crew network across Japan wherever the job takes us. The shoot fell on one of the hottest days of the Kyoto summer, with highs of 38°C.
What we delivered
We delivered the finished brand film, edited and colour graded in-house, together with aerial drone photography of the resort that the hotel requested. The client was delighted with the film and has stayed in touch, and we are talking about the next project together.
Planning a hotel shoot? See our hotel and resort video production in Japan. For another Kyoto project, filmed at the peak of cherry blossom, see Kamo Residences. For more of our work with Moriya Design Studio, see Oakwood in Azabu, Tokyo.
Client: ROKU KYOTO, LXR Hotels & Resorts (Hilton)
Agency: Moriya Design Studio
Location: Kyoto, Japan: ROKU KYOTO and Ryoan-ji temple
Services: Location scouting, storyboarding, creative planning, casting, filming permits, drone, production, editing, colour grading
Crew: Director/DOP Andrew Goldie, producer, camera assistant, lighting assistant, stylist, hair and make-up, van and driver
Deliverables: Hotel brand film; aerial stills
