Kamiya Family Residence Koan Teahouse

A tea room of three and a fraction mats

The Kamiya Family Residence Koan Teahouse (神谷家住宅孤葊, Kamiya-ke Jūtaku Koan) is a late Edo-period tea room in Shinsakae, Naka Ward, Nagoya City, Aichi Prefecture, registered as a National Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 13 August 2012. It is a single-storey timber structure roofed in copper sheet, with a floor area of just 10 square metres, standing on the garden side of the Hakuroken wing towards its western end.

The roof is gabled. Inside there is nothing but a tea room of three mats plus a daime mat and a preparation area. A daime mat is cut to roughly three quarters of the standard length, compressing the host's serving position so that more of the room is left to the guests.

Built in the closing years of the Edo period, the Kamiya Family Residence Koan Teahouse was moved to this site in 1911. Its registration number is 23-0342.

Timber with a history attached

The registration criterion is contribution to the historic landscape of Japan, and what carries this building is not its size but the provenance of its materials and the nerve of its design. According to the Agency for Cultural Affairs commentary, the thick round post beside the alcove and the alcove lintel, which retains colouring in a linked-ring pattern, are said to be timber salvaged from construction work at Nagoya Castle.

That is a tradition rather than a documented fact. Even so, the reuse of castle offcuts in townspeople's tea buildings was not unusual among Nagoya craftsmen, and the lintel with its colouring still legible gives the story something to rest on.

Three further buildings on the same plot were registered on the same day: the Hakuroken wing, the waiting arbor and the inner gate. Because the tea room, the waiting place and the gate all survive together, the complete shape of a roji, the garden path leading to a tea room, can still be read here.

What to look for

The sheer girth of the alcove post would be unremarkable in a hall of ten mats or more. In a room of three mats and a daime it dominates. Bringing an oversized member into a tight space is an aggressive decision by the standards of tea room design.

The coloured linked-ring pattern on the alcove lintel is the second thing to notice. Painted ornament of this kind is normally suppressed in a tea room built around the aesthetics of restraint. The Kamiya Family Residence Koan Teahouse sets that convention aside and lets the history of its salvaged timber show.

Consider also where the openings face. The building leans against the south side of Hakuroken and looks across the garden towards the waiting arbor. The angle at which a seated guest sees the garden was fixed at the outset.

Visiting and access

This is part of a private residence and is not open to the public. The grounds cannot be entered, and since the plot is now enclosed by later buildings the tea room cannot realistically be seen from the street either. Approaching the property to look or photograph is not appropriate. Locating the block and observing the surrounding townscape is as far as a visit can reasonably go.

The address is 2-chome Shinsakae, Naka Ward. The block lies east of Shinsakaemachi Station on the Higashiyama subway line, about five minutes on foot. Travellers who want to see tea architecture in Naka Ward that is actually accessible should consult the City of Nagoya list of cultural properties, which includes several registered tea buildings whose opening arrangements differ from one another.