Kishi Family Residence (Yokote)

A Meiji farmhouse and two storehouses in Yoshino

The Kishi Family Residence (季子家住宅, Kishi-ke Jūtaku) is a farmstead in Yoshino, Masuda-machi, Yokote City, Akita Prefecture, built in the late Meiji period (1898-1912), and its main house, inner storehouse and outer storehouse were registered together as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties of Japan on February 4, 2021.

The family name is read Kishi. Both the Agency for Cultural Affairs database and Yokote City's list of cultural properties give that reading, and the city's list records all three buildings as privately owned. It should not be confused with houses of families whose name is written 岸, which is also romanized Kishi.

Every building here dates from the late Meiji years. The main house was altered around 1975 and the two storehouses around 1969. The Agency singles out the main house as one of the large farmhouses still standing in this part of Akita.

Three buildings joined into one

At the Kishi Family Residence the main house stands in the middle of Yoshino hamlet with its front to the south. The inner storehouse is attached at its northwest corner and the outer storehouse at its southwest corner, so instead of a yard of separate buildings you get a single connected block.

The inner storehouse is a gable-entry (Tsumairi) earthen storehouse aligned north to south and housed inside a saya, a timber shelter built over the whole structure. The outer storehouse runs off the main house at a right angle (Kaneore), set slightly askew, and it too sits within a board-clad saya. According to the Agency, it served as a farm storehouse.

Building areas are 191 square meters for the main house, 85 for the inner storehouse and 122 for the outer storehouse. Their registration numbers run consecutively as 05-0230, 05-0231 and 05-0232, all part of the 97th round of registrations.

The criteria differ. The main house was registered as contributing to the historic landscape of the country, while both storehouses were registered as models of design, a recognition of craftsmanship such as earthen doors and roof framing.

Uchigura and togura in the Masuda area

Yokote City explains that in Masuda, a storehouse built behind the main house, covered by a saya and linked to the living quarters, is called an uchigura, or inner storehouse. From the street you cannot tell it exists, which the city presents as a building type typical of snow country. Many properties also keep a separate earthen storehouse at the back of the plot for supplies, known locally as a togura.

That description refers to the merchant houses of Masuda's town center, about 10.6 hectares selected as an Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings. The Kishi Family Residence is a farmhouse in Yoshino, about 4 kilometers east of that district in a straight line, yet it shares the same pairing of a main house with inner and outer storehouses.

The names do not line up perfectly. The Agency reads the outer storehouse of the Kishi Family Residence as sotogura, not the togura heard in the town center.

Visiting the Kishi Family Residence

The Kishi Family Residence is a private home, and neither the Agency nor Yokote City publishes opening days or admission details for it. Assume the interiors are not open. If you go, look at the exterior from the road and do not enter the grounds; when taking photos, keep the household's daily life out of the frame.

The address is 58 Muranoato, Yoshino, Masuda-machi. In a straight line the house lies about 6 kilometers east-southeast of Jūmonji Station on the JR Ōu Line and about 4 kilometers east of the Masuda townscape. We could not find a bus service to Yoshino, so a car is the practical way to get there.