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Miss Japan represents the Japanese imperial household and, by extension, the country of Japan itself. She is by Okamoto Menya Shojirō, artist name Menshō XII. Her personal name is Yamato Hideko and her kimono bears the imperial crest of the juni kiku bishi (twelve petal diamond-shaped chrysanthemum).
Rather than touring around the United States, following her receptions in California, Washington, D.C,. and New York City, she was held in the offices of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ until her formal placement with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. in late February of 1928, where she remains today.
Miss Japan retains nearly all of her accessories, missing only her parasol and ship ticket. Fortunately, she also retains her original small companion doll.
Miss Japan and the six principal city dolls were all made in Kyoto by Menshō XII and are of an all wood, articulated (mitsuore) construction, rather than the soft bodied ichimatsu form of the 41 other dolls representing the Japanese prefectures and overseas territorial holdings. Each of the Kyoto-made dolls were also provided with small Tokyo-made ichimatsu companion dolls.
She returned to Japan in 1988 to be part of the important exhibition of 19 Friendship Dolls and 34 of the “blue-eyed” Doll Messengers of Goodwill organized by the Kokusai Bunka Kyōkai (Japanese International Culture Association), Sogo Department Store and the Asahi Shimbun newspaper in Tokyo. Using Sogo Department Stores as the venue, from April to September, this exhibition visited ten different locations: Yokohama, Hiroshima, Tokushima, Kobe, Sapporo, Matsuyama and several locations in the greater Tokyo area, including Chiba, Hachioji, Kashiwa and Omiya.