First, the bad news: Kyoto can be a crushingly expensive place to visit. It's packed with once-in-a-lifetime attractions at once-in-a-lifetime prices. But here's the good news: many of the best bits are cheap, if not free. Here are some low-cost highlights.
Visit: Katsura Rikyu
Where else but Kyoto would one of the world's greatest gardens be a C-list attraction? The city is so overloaded with grand temples, shrines, gardens and villas that this 17-acre former imperial garden often falls off the radar. It doesn't help that the Imperial Household Agency issues only a few visitor permits a day and doesn't accept walk-in tourists. But it's worth the effort. Katsura Rikyu is a 400-year-old retreat with arguably the city's greatest garden. The ponds and pine trees create miniature landscapes that mimic famous scenes from Japan. The buildings are often described as the finest example of the restrained, tea-house-style sukiya architecture that minimalists and modernists alike cite as an influence. Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius have both said Katsura Rikyu changed their thinking. If you want to understand Japanese gardens or classic architecture, this is the place to come. And it's free.
• Bookings: Imperial Household Agency Kyoto Office, 3 Kyoto-gyoen, Kamigyo-ku, +81 75 211 1215, sankan.kunaicho.go.jp/english/index.html. Tours Mon-Fri, 9am, 10am, 11am, 1.30pm, 2.30pm, 3.30pm
Eat: Oku
The Miyamasou ryokan is one of Japan's great dining destinations. Up in the forested Miyama mountains, north of Kyoto, chef Hisato Nakahigashi serves kaiseki (a traditional, multi-course dinner) prepared with wild vegetables, herbs, fish and meat, all sourced from within 20km of his kitchen. If you can afford it (prices start at ¥15,750, around £130), and don't mind the 50-minute drive from central Kyoto, it's a meal you won't soon forget. But there's an easier, cheaper way to try the man's food. In 2008, he opened Oku, a cafe in Kyoto's Gion district. The original plan was to use the space as a retail outlet for a line of lacquerware that Nakahigashi designs with a young ceramicist – and it developed into a cafe because the chef wanted to let people test-drive his plates and bowls. So you can now eat a tapas-style sampler of Miyamasou cuisine, along with miso soup, rice and pickles for £20. And if you like the tableware, you can buy it on the way out, though not on any shoestring budget.
• 570-119 Gionmachi-Minamigawa, Higashiyama-Ku, +81 75 531 4776, oku-style.com
Buy: Karacho cards
Karacho isn't an obvious choice for a budget itinerary. The company specialises in woodblock-printed paper (karakami) at prices that will make your eyes pop out of their sockets. When it was formed back in 1624, Karacho was one of many companies making karakami by hand. Now it's the only one. You can find their designs on sliding doors and wallpaper in luxury hotels, ryokan, castles and tea shops. If you want to take a screen home, expect to pay upwards of £1,600. But these days you can also pick up hand-printed business cards (£29 for 50), greetings cards (£10 each) or postcards (£4) bearing the company's classic designs.
• Cocon Karasuma, Karasuma Dori Shijo-sagaru, Shimogyo-ku, +81 75 353 5885, karacho.co.jp
See: maiko
Geisha, or geiko in Kyoto parlance, are traditionally off limits for tourists. Even your average Kyoto-ite doesn't have the connections to arrange an evening in a teahouse with the painted ladies. Some high-end hotels, ryokans and restaurants stage informal dinners with maiko (apprentices), but these feel like the geisha equivalent of a speaking engagement. The girls do a short dance, then join you at your table for small talk and parlour games. Unless you speak their language or thrive on rock-paper-scissors, you'll get more for your money at the seasonal dance extravaganzas in kaburenjo (arts theatres). Each of Kyoto's five geiko troupes has its own theatre. For a few weeks a year they stage public performances (tickets from £17, advance booking essential). The people's favourite is the Miyako Odori by the Gion geisha troupe, dedicated to the cherry blossom season. Cheaper still, loiter on the olde-worlde streets of Pontocho or Hanamikoji in the early evening. It won't be long before you see a maiko scuttling to an appointment. It's one of Kyoto's most popular photo ops, though the girls are heading to work and no more want to stop for tourist snaps than you want a camera shoved in your face on your morning commute, so be discreet.
• Gion Kobu Kaburenjo, 570-2 Gionmachi-minamigawa, Higashiyama-ku. Box office: +81 75 541 3391, miyako-odori.jp. Daily April 1-April 30, 12.30pm, 2pm, 3.30pm, 4.50pm
Stay: 9hours
Kyoto has half a dozen design hotels, but this is the only one that charges less than £40 a night – 9hours, a capsule hotel by industrial designer Fumie Shibata. Like any other capsule hotel, it offers a fibreglass oblong in a great location at a rock-bottom price. But while most evoke dreary, dystopian hatcheries, this one is genuinely comfortable and looks better than some top-end hotels. Shibata used a monochrome palette, creating an all-white lobby, lockers and showers, black and white amenities and curvaceous white pods set into a jet-black wall. Graphic designer Masaaki Hiromura added ideograms to guide guests from entrance to locker to shower to pod and back again. You don't need a word of Japanese; navigating 9hours is iPod intuitive. The capsules aren't as claustrophobic as you might fear – there's room to sit upright – and they have amenities that you wouldn't expect of budget accommodation. The pillows are six-part ergonomic masterpieces that support your neck no matter how you sleep. In the morning, the alarms use light rather than sound, nudging you into consciousness by progressively brightening the capsule. Given the proximity of the other guests, this is no trivial convenience. And, perhaps best of all, you set your own check-out time. Despite the hotel name, you're allowed to stay for up to 17 hours, and as nice as the place is, there's no chance you'll want to be there that long.
• Termachi Dori Shijo-sagaru, Shimogyo-ku, +81 75 353 9005, 9hours.jp/systems/index. Rooms from £38pp
• Nicholas Caldicott is a freelance writer based in Japan. He wrote the first Time Out guide to Kyoto
