I always tell my clients not to try to see everything — Kyoto has over 1,600 Buddhist temples and 400 Shinto shrines, and it's overwhelming if you let it be. I recommend choosing three or four — Fushimi Inari's vermillion torii gates, Kinkaku-ji's gold-leaf pavilion, the moss gardens of Saiho-ji — and giving each one your full attention.

One of my favorite tips for clients heading to Kyoto: walk the Higashiyama district between 6am and 8am. The stone-paved lanes of Ninenzaka and Sannenzaka are empty at that hour, the shops still shuttered, just incense and birdsong in the air. It's one of my favorite quiet pleasures of Japanese travel.

I love booking my clients into a machiya instead of a hotel — a traditional Kyoto townhouse. These narrow wooden residences, once home to merchants, have been beautifully restored, and I think they give you a much more intimate feel for the city: tatami rooms, inner courtyard gardens, sliding paper screens.

My honest advice: cherry blossom season in late March–early April is magical but very crowded. I often steer clients toward autumn foliage in mid-November instead, or late May and October, when the conditions are just as lovely with far fewer visitors.