Kojima Family Residence South Storehouse

A small storehouse behind the guest wing

Kojima Family Residence South Storehouse (小島家住宅南蔵, Kojima-ke Jūtaku Minami-gura) is a late Edo-period clay-walled storehouse in the castle town of Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture, built between 1830 and 1867 and entered on Japan's register of Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2005.

It is a Dozo-zukuri building of two stories with a tiled roof and a floor area of 37 square meters. The roof is a Kirizuma-zukuri gable in Sangawara-buki pantiles, entered on the eaves side in the Hirairi manner. Of the seven registered Kojima buildings this is the smallest, about an eighth the size of the 307 square meters covered by the west brewery complex.

It stands toward the south of the plot, behind the guest wing on its western side. The Agency for Cultural Affairs classifies this storehouse and the guest wing under housing, while the north and west breweries fall under secondary industry. The plot of roughly 1,000 tsubo was divided in character as well as in plan: brewing to the north, living and receiving guests to the south. Kojima Family Residence South Storehouse belongs to the southern half.

Why so much care went into so small a building

Registration came under the criterion of contribution to the historic landscape, with the number 23-0175. Seven Kojima buildings entered the register together on 9 February 2005: the main house, the guest wing, this storehouse, the north sake brewery and north storehouse, the west sake brewery and preparation room, the reception room and the roofed wall. The family have brewed here since 1597 by their own reckoning.

By area alone the building is an outbuilding. What the official assessment values is the quality of the work: small in scale, carefully finished down to the details, and indispensable to the composition of the residence.

In practice that means a canopy on the east face sheltering the Tomae doorway, and small canopied windows on the front and sides. Door and window surrounds are finished in kakeko-nuri, and a moulded cornice runs beneath the eaves. Kakeko-nuri builds the plaster of door and frame into interlocking steps so that no gap remains, keeping out fire and damp alike. The cornice adds one horizontal shadow line across the wall. Neither is strictly necessary in a building meant only to hold things.

What to look for

Take the doorway head on. In a clay-walled storehouse the door matters less than the apparatus protecting it: the canopy throws the rain clear, the stepped plaster closes the joint. How the opening is shut is where the thinking of the type concentrates.

Move up to the cornice. A horizontal band across white plaster divides the two-story wall into an upper and a lower register, and on a building this small a single line does a lot of work.

Note the windows too, small and hooded. They admit the minimum of light and air, and keeping openings tight is what steadies temperature and humidity within. The breweries to the north are sealed for fermenting and maturing; Kojima Family Residence South Storehouse is sealed to protect household goods. Different purposes arrive at the same answer.

Then the scale. At 37 square meters this is a building close to human size. The largest and the smallest storehouse on the plot were registered on the same day, which says that the residence was judged as a whole composition rather than by the size of any one part.

Visiting

Kojima Family Residence South Storehouse is privately owned and the interior is closed. Standing to the south of the plot behind the guest wing, it is not visible from the street.

Kojima Jozo sells nindōshu on the premises. Inuyama Tourist Association gives the hours as 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. with a break from noon to 1:00 p.m., closed Sundays and Wednesday mornings; telephone 0568-61-0165, parking for 10 cars.

Since 2025 part of the compound has operated as lodging. The operator calls the Kojima property the Neriya wing and describes guest rooms, a Japanese restaurant, a tea room and a garden within it, and advertises tours taking in the storehouses, though these are listed as in preparation. Ask the operator directly about access to the south storehouse.

The nearest station is Meitetsu Inuyama, about 10 minutes on foot from the west exit; Inuyama is roughly 30 minutes from Meitetsu Nagoya Station. The site fits easily into a walk taking in Inuyama Castle and the old town.

Photography from public streets is unrestricted. Inside the gate the ground is private and in daily use by a shop and an inn, so entry and interior photography need the owner's or operator's agreement.