This July will mark four years since the Kyoto Animation arson attack, which took the lives of 36 employees. Shortly after the attack, Kyoto Animation president Hideaki Hatta made a commitment to memorialize and honor those whose lives were lost while creating art enjoyed by people around the world. After issues arose from where Studio 1 was located, a quaint neighborhood in Kyoto’s south, the animation studio finally announced its intentions to build a memorial site.
According to Kyoto Animation’s lawyer, the first memorial site will be erected near Kyoto Animation’s headquarters in Uji City, rather than on the site of the arson attack in Fushimi, Kyoto. The headquarters were only a short train stop away from the site of Studio 1 and was within a 10-minute walking distance. The plan is to have the first memorial in a public space as a reminder of the incident, honoring the victims and thanks for the support from people around the world.
This first site is planned to be open by July 18, 2024, with the current staff of Kyoto Animation encouraged to submit design plans. A committee with families of the victim and staff from Kyoto Animation will be set up in July to organize the memorial site and work with the local government.
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A second memorial site will be erected in the space where Studio 1 once was. It will be a private memorial within a new building that will be used for business purposes by Kyoto Animation and not be open to the public.
The attack, which occurred on July 18, 2019, took the lives of 36 employees, including The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya director Yasuhiro Takemoto, animator Yoshiji Kigami, chief animation director on the Free! franchise Futoshi Nishiya, Sound! Euphonium character designer Shouko Ikeda, and many more. 35 more people who were inside the building at the time were also injured.
Source: NHK
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Daryl Harding is a Senior Japan Correspondent for Crunchyroll News. He also runs a YouTube channel about Japan stuff called TheDoctorDazza, tweets at @DoctorDazza, and posts photos of his travels on Instagram.
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