Kurama Onsen
くらま温泉
You can use the bath with your tattoos visible. Nothing to cover, no size limit, and nothing to declare at the desk.
No restrictions, stated plainly on the facility’s own site. The only unconditional day-use bath found anywhere in Kyoto.
刺青やタトゥーがあるお客様もご利用いただけます。ただし、暴力団や反社会勢力に属する方のご利用はご遠慮いただいております。
The operator’s own wording, copied from the page linked below. Holding up your phone settles the question faster than explaining it.
That is not a figure of speech. Of the eleven published bathhouse policies we found in Kyoto, seven ban stickers, paint or concealing seals by name — not merely tattoos — which closes the workaround that gets you into a bath in Tokyo or Osaka. The hotels that say yes here are hotels, so they want you staying the night. Kurama is the one place in the city you can turn up at, pay, and bathe. It is also the furthest: half an hour north of Demachiyanagi on the Eizan line, in cedar forest rather than in the city. It was shut for three years after typhoon damage and the pandemic before reopening, so anything written before that reopening is describing a closed building.
There is nothing to do. Check in, go to the bath. No seal to buy, no measuring, no declaration to make, and no size at which it stops being allowed. If a member of staff does query it, the operator’s own wording is above — showing it ends the conversation without either of you needing the other’s language.
Confirmed Confirmed from official site
Read on: kurama-spa.com
Best for: An open-air bath in the cedar forest north of the city, with no policy to negotiate
Closed for three years after typhoon damage and the pandemic; reopened and now running 10:00–21:00. Reachable from Demachiyanagi on the Eizan line, then a short walk or the free shuttle.
Kyoto is the strictest of the big three. Seven of eleven published bathhouse policies there ban stickers, paint or concealing seals by name, not just tattoos, which makes an unconditional listing unusual enough to be worth the trip across town.