Golden teacup worth £52,000 stolen from Tokyo department store

Stolen cup part of display of gold items at luxury departmental store

Police in Japan are looking for a man accused of stealing a golden teacup worth £52,100 from a luxury department store in Tokyo.

The teacup, made of 24-carat gold, was being displayed in an outlet of the Takashimaya departmental store chain along with other old items as part of the Grand Gold Exhibition.

Local media reported that the exhibition features over 1,000 pieces, including oval gold koban coins widely used in the Edo Period (1603-1868), and also includes teaware, tableware, and other artefacts.

An employee from the store, which is in Tokyo’s Nihonbashi district, discovered the theft and reported it to the police a little after 12 noon on Thursday.

The retailer said: “It was kept in an unlocked transparent box at the time, so it could be taken out easily for customers to take a close look.”

The thief was caught on security footage and can be seen putting the cup in his bag before fleeing, reported local media. The theft is currently under investigation and the police have said the suspect appears to be a man in his 20s or 30s, and was dressed in a grey sweatshirt and black pants and carried a grey backpack.

The tea cup was created by Koichi Ishikawa, a renowned goldsmith, reported The Japan Times. His craftsmanship won him the esteemed Tokyo Governor's Award in 1988.

The exhibition also features a traditional Japanese screen valued at over 100 million yen (£522,980) and a 2.1-metre-high golden dragon figure decorated with a round, 3,000-fold leaf piece valued at 38 million yen (£198,778).

Among concerns, Takashimaya, Japan’s version of Harrod’s, said they will continue to display the rest of the artefacts but will increase security preparations.

Despite security being present, the store said no one noticed the theft until around 20 minutes after the theft took place.

In December, Takashimaya officials had to apologise for delivering hundreds of collapsed strawberry Christmas cakes. Out of the 2,900 cakes that were delivered in the run-up to Christmas, 807 arrived damaged, sparking an immediate social media backlash.

The store said it had “betrayed the expectations of many” and senior managing director Kazuhisa Yokoyama held a news conference in Tokyo and bowed deeply to customers to show his remorse.