A rented house in Sendagi that two writers passed through
Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence (明治村森鷗外・夏目漱石住宅, Meijimura Mori Ōgai Natsume Sōseki Jūtaku) is a house of about 1887 standing at the Meiji Mura museum in Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture, and listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2003.
It stood in Sendagi in Tokyo, on ground that is now 2-chōme Mukōgaoka in Bunkyō ward. The museum records that a businessman named Nakajima, of Ushigome in Tokyo, built it as a home for his son Jōkichi to move into on graduating in medicine. Jōkichi was posted elsewhere and never lived there, so the house stood empty and almost new.
Mori Ōgai (森鷗外) took it instead. He rented the house in September 1890 and stayed a little over a year, calling it Sendasanbō. Here he kept up the literary review Shigarami Zōshi and wrote the story Fumizukai. In January 1892 he moved on to the Kanchōrō, at number 21 in the same Sendagi district.
In 1894 the house was given to Saitō Agu, a historian and a fellow student of Natsume Sōseki (夏目漱石). Agu took a post in Sendai and then went abroad, and in 1903 Sōseki, newly back from his studies in London, moved in. He stayed until 1906 and wrote I Am a Cat here. Bunkyō ward records that The Tower of London, Botchan and Kusamakura also came out of this address. The site in Tokyo is known as the Cat House and is marked today by a stone monument.
The building itself was dismantled in 1963 and reassembled at Meiji Mura the following year, in 1964. The building area is 130 square meters.
Why Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence was listed
The house was registered on 1 December 2003 under number 23-0069, with the criterion that it offers a model of design. What the Agency for Cultural Affairs cites is not the two writers but the building type: an ordinary middle class house of the middle Meiji years, surviving in its ordinary form.
It is single storey timber under a Yosemune-zukuri hipped roof of Sangawara-buki pantiles, with walls of Shitami-itabari weatherboarding held by battens. The plan is the standard four room grid known as ta-no-ji, with a veranda run along the front of the Zashiki reception rooms. All of that is conventional Japanese domestic building.
The departures appear in 2 places. A room beside the entrance served for receiving visitors and as a study, and a short corridor was cut from the kitchen. Each is a first step away from a plan in which rooms open directly into one another, and towards rooms reached separately from a passage. The Agency describes these as the first signs of the modern house.
What to look for
A corridor barely worth the name
In front of the 3 mat maid's room runs a passage too short to be called a corridor. It covers almost no distance, but with it you can reach the back of the house without crossing another room. Sliding a screen and walking through someone else's space had been the normal way to move around a Japanese house; here, for the first time, is floor given over to circulation alone. Every later corridor plan grows out of this. It is easy to walk past, so keep the layout in mind.
The study that pushes south
Beside the entrance, one room projects out to the south. It received guests and served as a study. Detach that projection from the house and you have the Western style parlour of later decades. Inside Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence this room has been set up as it would have looked while Sōseki was working in it.
Reading the house through the novel
I Am a Cat is set in this building. The museum notes that the house described in the text follows the real one closely. Entrance, study, veranda, the reception room facing the garden: matching remembered scenes to actual rooms turns the plan into somewhere people lived. The 2 tenancies are 13 years apart, so the writers never shared the roof.
Visiting Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence
The house is an exhibit building at Meiji Mura, at plot 9 in district 1, close to the main gate and reached early in a visit from that side. No building carries its own admission; the museum ticket covers all of them. The interior is open, though parts of the grounds are closed off for safety and buildings occasionally shut for repair.
Admission is 2,500 yen for adults, 1,500 yen for high school students, and 700 yen for junior high and elementary school pupils, free for children below school age (checked September 2026). Groups of 20 or more get a lower rate, and an annual pass is sold as Meijimura Jūmin Tōroku.
Opening hours change through the year: 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. from April to July and in September, October and March; 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. in August; 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. in November, extended to 5:00 p.m. on Saturdays and public holidays; 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. from December to February. Last admission is 30 minutes before closing, and closure days fall irregularly, so consult the museum calendar before setting out.
Photography for personal use needs no permission. Tripods are not permitted indoors, and photography from within the wooded slopes is prohibited. Only part of the tatami floor is accessible, so check where you are allowed to stand before framing a shot.
Buses to Meiji Mura leave the east exit of Inuyama Station on the Meitetsu network, with direct services also running from Nagoya Station and Sakae. Drivers come 3 kilometers from the Komaki-higashi interchange on the Chūō Expressway; parking outside the north gate is 1,000 yen for a standard car. District 1 lies at the far end from that north gate, so the shuttle bus or the vintage streetcar saves a long walk. Anyone wanting the original site in Tokyo should head for 2-20-7 Mukōgaoka, Bunkyō ward, about 10 minutes on foot from Sendagi Station on the Tokyo Metro.
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Q&A
- Can you go inside Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence?
- Yes. The interior is open, and the room beside the entrance that served as parlour and study is presented as it would have looked while Natsume Sōseki worked there. Some parts may be closed for safety or repair.
- Did Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki live in this house at the same time?
- No. Mori Ōgai rented it from 1890 to 1892, and Natsume Sōseki from 1903 to 1906. The tenancies do not overlap.
- Which works were written at Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence?
- Natsume Sōseki wrote I Am a Cat in this house, and Bunkyō ward records that The Tower of London, Botchan and Kusamakura were also published from here. Mori Ōgai wrote Fumizukai and other pieces during his tenancy.
- Where did Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence originally stand?
- In Sendagi in Tokyo, on what is now 2-chōme Mukōgaoka in Bunkyō ward. The house was dismantled in 1963 and moved to Meiji Mura in 1964. A stone monument marks the original site.
- How much does it cost to see Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence?
- There is no separate charge beyond museum admission: 2,500 yen for adults, 1,500 yen for high school students, 700 yen for junior high and elementary school pupils, and free below school age (checked September 2026).
Basic Information
| Name | Meiji Village Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence |
|---|---|
| Location | Meiji Mura, 1 Uchiyama, Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure) |
| Year Designated | Registered in 2003 (Heisei 15) |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Building area 130 square meters, single storey timber construction |
| Owner | Meiji Mura Public Interest Foundation |
| Public Access | Open. Interior viewable as an exhibit building at Meiji Mura |
References
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, National Cultural Properties Database: Meijimura Mori Ogai Natsume Soseki Jutaku
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00003656
- Cultural Heritage Online: Meijimura Mori Ogai Natsume Soseki Jutaku
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/179876
- Meiji Mura Museum: Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki Residence
- https://www.meijimura.com/sight/%E6%A3%AE%E9%B4%8E%E5%A4%96%E3%83%BB%E5%A4%8F%E7%9B%AE%E6%BC%B1%E7%9F%B3%E4%BD%8F%E5%AE%85/
- Bunkyo City: Site of Natsume Soseki's former residence, the Cat House
- https://www.city.bunkyo.lg.jp/b014/p003775.html
- Meiji Mura Museum: Opening hours and closing days
- https://www.meijimura.com/guide/open/
- Meiji Mura Museum: Tickets and admission
- https://www.meijimura.com/guide/price/
- Meiji Mura Museum: Access
- https://www.meijimura.com/guide/access/
Last verified: 2026.09.03