Tokyo International Players were black-tie occasions. Today, TIP generally presents four mainstage shows per season. In June 2009, TIP launched its "Second Stage" series with "Honiefaith" by Monty DiPietro. Second Stage features smaller-scale, black box-style productions. The Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Imperial Hotel, Tokyo, one of the few buildings in Tokyo to withstand the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake, had an intimate theater which hosted the club until the early 1960s. Most TIP performances from 1974 to 2007 were staged in the Grand Ballroom of the Tokyo American Club. Currently, TIP uses several professional theater spaces in the Tokyo metropolitan area including Theater Sun-mall in
Imperial Hotel (company) Imperial Hotel (company) On November 28, 1887, Kihachiro Okura and Eiichi Shibusawa submitted an application to form a new company called Yugen Sekinin Tokyo Hoteru (Tokyo Hotel Co.), in order to "build a large hotel in Tokyo and to conduct the business of renting rooms to foreign guests, and for parties and other events...". There were initially 21 investors, with the largest (21.15%) being the Imperial Household Ministry. Site preparation for the first Imperial Hotel started in July 1888, and construction was begun in the fall of that year. On 7 July 1890, with the hotel almost complete, the name