The English B&B that is famous in Japan Published duration 5 June 2018

media caption Fosse Farmhouse is the setting for a popular anime programme called Kinmoza

A Wiltshire bed and breakfast has become a hit with Japanese tourists after it became the inspiration for a popular TV cartoon.

Fosse Farmhouse near Castle Combe is the setting for the Japanese animated series Kinmoza, which attracts more than five million viewers.

Owner Caron Cooper said the show has led to more than half of her guests coming from Japan every year.

Ms Cooper said it began after a chance meeting with a Japanese couple in 1989.

image copyright Fosse Farmhouse image caption Film footage of Fosse Farmhouse was converted into animation for the series

Shozo and Yasuko Mitani told her visiting the four-star farmhouse was "like falling through a tunnel in Alice in Wonderland".

They returned to Japan with the idea of setting up their own English-themed bed and breakfast where they displayed photographs of Fosse Farmhouse.

This led to the guesthouse being featured in a popular magazine and Ms Cooper becoming well-known in Japan.

'Quintessentially British'

In 2012, comic book Kiniro-Mosaic, also known as Kinmoza, was published.

Based on Ms Cooper's life at Fosse Farmhouse the story centres on a teenage girl called Alice Cartelet who lives there.

The comic was so successful it was turned into a TV series and film made using the hand-drawn animation technique know as anime.

Studio Gokumi converted filmed footage of Fosse Farmhouse into animated frames for the series.

Kinmoza fan Yuki Inoue from Tokyo said the series is so popular because Japanese people especially like the "quintessentially British countryside of the Cotswolds".

Ms Cooper said the story is "unbelievable but true", and "just like Alice in Wonderland it's getting curiouser and curiouser."

Related Topics Japan

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