Video footage taken at Shimada Electric Manufacturing Co. in Tokyo’s Hachioji city shows children and other visitors pushing to their hearts’ content at a wildly popular interactive display of elevator buttons designed or produced by the firm. (Erina Ito)

Photo/Illutration The popular wall of 1,000 buttons at Shimada Electric Manufacturing Co.’s plant in Hachioji, western Tokyo, seen on Aug. 10, offers a variety of buttons for visitors to press to their heart’s content. (Erina Ito)

For as long as he can remember, 6-year-old Yoshiki Nishizawa has always loved pushing buttons.

Since around the time he was 3, whenever he would see an elevator panel, he would rush to be the first to press one.

Even at home, he added an illustration of buttons to a sliding door that he can push to pretend that it works like an elevator.

So, when Nishizawa’s mother took him to an elevator-button manufacturing plant in Tokyo on Aug. 10, and he looked up at a wall covered in hundreds of buttons--1,048, to be exact--he was simply awestruck.

“Am I free to press all of these?” he asked excitedly.

Some were marked with bizarre descriptions, like the one that said “Never! press me.” Another one shows a star followed by the letter “G.” One was simply called “Bonus.”

Nishizawa and his mother had come from Chikuma, Nagano Prefecture, to tour Shimada Electric Manufacturing Co.’s plant in Hachioji, western Tokyo.

The company’s tours have recently become a big draw for kids and other button-pushing enthusiasts.

All the available tour slots for the rest of the year are already booked solid, company representatives said.

Among the popular attractions, the tour offers a game to see how many buttons visitors can press in just 30 seconds.

Nishizawa played the game with a serious look on his face and smiled proudly when he finished, having expertly pressed 68 buttons.

Founded in 1933, Shimada has been providing, among other things, buttons and lighting fixtures for elevators on a made-to-order basis.

The company’s products have been used at landmark locations in Japan, including the Tokyo metropolitan government buildings, Tokyo Midtown and Roppongi Hills, and Abeno Harukas in Osaka.

Shimada only began offering tours of the plant a few years ago, in 2018.

“We deal mostly in business-to-business transactions,” Sachi Omori, a public relations official with the company, said in explaining why her employer introduced the tours. “We wanted members of the public to know what we are making.”

It set up its massively popular wall of 1,000 buttons two years later.

“You only have one button to press when you take an elevator,” Omori said. “Here, by contrast, you are free to press as many as you like.”

Tours of the plant, which are offered on the 10th, 20th and 30th days of the month that do not fall on days off, are in such demand that reservation slots book up within half an hour once they open, she said.

Shimada added 54 new buttons in August that the company’s employees selected from design proposals sent in by the public.

The president’s award went to one that says, “You aren’t earning enough annual income to press this.”

Another new addition says “Pien,” a slang word currently in vogue that imitates the sound of crying and often goes with a pleading face emoji.

There is also one that reads “More calories to be consumed each time you press,” while another is shaped like the head of a mayonnaise bottle.

The tour’s popularity ironically comes at a bad time for buttons.

Throughout the novel coronavirus pandemic, people have had higher awareness about disinfecting and sterilizing objects that often get touched.

Shimada officials said in light of that, the company is now working on developing touchless buttons.

Tour reservations can be made through the company’s website (https://www.shimada.cc/tour), which is in Japanese only. The tour slots for January through March 2023 become available for reservation on Dec. 1.