Former Isobe Family Residence, Inner Storehouse

The Largest Storehouse, at the Very Back of the Garden

The Former Isobe Family Residence, Inner Storehouse (旧磯部家住宅奥土蔵, Kyū Isobe-ke Jūtaku Okudozō) is an earthen-walled storehouse of 1875 in Inuyama City, Aichi Prefecture, entered on the national register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 9 February 2005. Built in Dozo-zukuri construction with two stories, a tiled roof and a building area of 47 square meters, it measures four ken along the ridge and two and a half across.

It occupies the eastern edge of the plot, at the back of the rear garden. From the main house on Honmachi Street you pass the inner courtyard and then the rear garden to reach it, and there the property ends. The building is a size larger than the other storehouse on the site, and its Japanese name, okudozo, simply records that it is the one further in.

The roof is Kirizuma-zukuri, gabled, in Sangawara-buki pantiles, and entry is from the long side in the Hirairi manner, under a canopy on the west face. This was where the family's stock was kept.

Why It Was Registered, and the Decision to Plaster Everything

The criterion applied reads "contributes to the historic landscape of the nation." The register number is 23-0171, from the forty-fifth round, and the listing came on the same day as the main house, the rear parlor, the storehouse and the storage shed.

What sets this building apart is how far the plastering was carried. Door and window openings are worked in stepped kakeko-nuri. Moulded bands run under the eaves and along the keraba, the raked edges where the gable roof runs down at the ends. The canopy on the west face was treated the same way, with its posts, girders, beams and even the underside of its roof encased in earth.

A canopy is a place where exposed timber would normally be acceptable. Encasing it means someone decided to leave no route by which a flying ember could work its way in. The Agency for Cultural Affairs database calls the exterior of the Former Isobe Family Residence, Inner Storehouse solid and worked through to the smallest detail.

A storehouse holding stock is not only holding the family's own property. Plastering to this extent was a matter of commercial credit as much as of fire safety.

What to Look For

Walk around to the west face and look up under the canopy. No timber is showing: the gaps between the rafters have been filled with earth and lime. Compare it with the other storehouse on the same plot and the difference is immediate.

Then follow the moulded band. It does not stop at the horizontal eaves but continues down the raking gable edges, and how the craftsmen turned those corners is the thing to judge.

The Former Isobe Family Residence, Inner Storehouse now works as a rented gallery, with 68.69 square meters of usable floor. If you come on a day when an exhibition is running you can stand inside it, which is the only way to register the thickness of the walls and the height of the ceiling. The artwork and the building can be looked at together.

A portable ramp is available to help wheelchair users in and out, arranged in advance.

Visiting

The building is open year round as part of the Former Isobe Residence Restored Facility, and admission is free. Hours are 9:00 to 17:00, with last entry at 16:30. The site closes from 29 to 31 December, and may close at short notice when a weather warning is issued.

Renting the space carries a separate fee. Residents of Inuyama may apply from the first day of the month three months before the date of use, and non-residents from the first day of the month two months before. The portable ramp is also booked through the Historic Town Development Division of the Inuyama City Board of Education on 0568-44-0354.

Personal photography is permitted. Commercial shoots, filming with equipment, and photography in special costume require a written proposal submitted in advance to that same division. Group visits and school trips need a prior consultation.

The site is about ten minutes on foot from the west exit of Meitetsu Inuyama Station, and Inuyama is roughly 25 minutes from Meitetsu Nagoya by limited express. The Wanmaru-kun community bus stops at Ekimae-dori, two minutes away. There is no parking on site. To find out what the Former Isobe Family Residence, Inner Storehouse is being used for on a given day, telephone 0568-65-3444.