Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse

A 1916 fermentation storehouse that became a museum

Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse is an earthen-walled storehouse of 1916 in the town of Taketoyo, Aichi Prefecture, registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2016. It stands on the premises of Nakasada Shoten (中定商店大五蔵, also written Nakasada Shōten Daigo-gura), a firm that has made soybean miso and tamari soy sauce here since 1879, and it is the oldest of the company's three registered buildings.

The building is a two-storied Dozo-zukuri structure with a tiled roof and a floor area of 106 square meters. What stands out in the Agency for Cultural Affairs record is the shape of the plan. It is not rectangular but close to a trapezoid, because the plot itself is irregular and the storehouse was fitted to its outline. A square plan suits a brewery better, since vats line up in rows. Choosing a trapezoid instead was a decision to use every part of a tight site.

It was built as a fermentation storehouse. Later it held salt, and in 1987 the interior was converted into a small museum, the Jozo Densho-kan. The repairs listed in the national record for 1966, 1973 and 1987 track those changes of use. Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse has survived a century by taking on a new job each time the old one ended.

Why it was registered, and the low upper floor

Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse was entered on the register of Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 29 November 2016 under registration number 23-0468. The criterion cited was contribution to the historic landscape of the country. Two neighbours on the same site were registered the same day: the Shoni Storehouse (23-0469) and the Shosan Storehouse (23-0470).

The interior explains part of the value. Although the building has two floors, the upper one has a low ceiling. It was called the nikai-koji, the second-floor koji room, and it was where koji mould was grown on misodama, balls of steamed soybeans pressed by hand. A low ceiling means a small volume of air, and a small volume holds its temperature and humidity steadily. The brewing process is written into the section of the building.

From outside, the black walls carry the character. Taketoyo shipped miso and tamari by port and rail from the early Meiji era onward, and by the company's own account more than fifty brewers were working in the town in the early Showa years. The look of that street of black storehouses survives around Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse.

What to look for inside

The interior is open as the Jozo Densho-kan, a museum of brewing. On display are the tools once used in this storehouse and its neighbours: a wooden press, mash implements, ledgers, product labels. Most of them can be handled and worked by visitors rather than viewed behind glass.

The labels on the walls are easy to walk past. A previous head of the firm collected them without limiting himself to his own products, so the sheets carry the shop names of soy sauce and tamari makers from across the Chita Peninsula. They record how many brewing houses stood in Taketoyo far more concretely than a statistic would.

The trapezoidal plan is documented in the national record. Once inside Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse, watch how the walls are set against one another as you move toward the back.

The Shoni Storehouse stands toward the south of the same site and the Shosan Storehouse at the southeast corner, both with black exterior walls. Tracing the three positions on the ground makes clear how the work was divided between them.

Visiting Nakasada Shoten Daigo Storehouse

The Jozo Densho-kan is open from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and admission is free. It closes on Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays, the Obon period in August and the New Year period. A telephone reservation must be made in advance; same-day requests are not accepted. Call Nakasada Shoten on 0569-72-0030, weekdays between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. Some dates cannot be accommodated.

This is a working brewery as well as a museum. Visits are guided by a member of staff and combine an explanation of the production process with a walk through the storehouses. No official statement covers photography, so ask when you book. Fees and conditions can change, and the same call is the place to confirm them.

A shop called Hongura on the same site sells miso, tamari soy sauce and koji. It opens at 9:00 a.m. and closes at 6:00 p.m., earlier in winter, and keeps the same closed days as the museum. Parking is available for four cars and one coach.

Taketoyo Station on the JR Taketoyo Line is the nearest station: follow the track north, turn right, and it is a walk of 4 minutes. From Chita-Taketoyo Station on the Meitetsu Kowa Line the walk is 13 minutes. By car it is about 10 minutes from the Handa interchange on the Chita Peninsula Road, which is easily confused with the Handa-Chuo interchange one exit earlier.