North American Storehouse, Former Nara Family Residence

The largest of the seven, and the later half of a pair

At about 184 square meters, the north rice storehouse is the largest of the seven annexes on the former Nara estate at Kanaashi Koizumi in northern Akita City. Built in 1908 (Meiji 41), it stands to the north of the south rice storehouse on a north–south axis, eight ken along the front by three and a half deep, with a lean-to porch two and a half ken wide across its east front.

It was not conceived on its own. Its gabled steel-sheet roof was laid continuous with that of the south storehouse, so that the two form one long unbroken range. The front doorway closes with a pair of swinging earthen doors, and four windows along the rear are fitted with single-swing shutters. The walls are white lime plaster, and the lower walls of the lean-to are clad in vertical board siding.

Completing the rice range

The south storehouse came first, in 1893; fifteen years later the north storehouse extended the line. Adding a second, larger storehouse to the same roofline speaks to a rising harvest and a household confident enough to invest in more storage. The Nara were among the foremost farming families in Akita, and the paired storehouses are the built measure of the crop that sustained the estate.

When the site's seven annexes were entered on the national register of tangible cultural properties in 2006, the citation valued their contribution to the historic landscape. Completeness is the point. Akita has other designated farmhouses, but none keeps such a full set of working outbuildings, and the continuous rice range is the most visible expression of that. The north storehouse, as the larger and later half, shows how the estate's storage grew over a generation.

What to look for on a visit

The former Nara residence is open as an annex of the Akita Prefectural Museum, and admission is free. Take in the two rice storehouses as one long building first, then find the join where the north storehouse meets the south: knowing that the north half is the later addition changes how the range reads. Up close, the swinging earthen doors and the board-clad lean-to walls reward a look. Museum staff interpret the grounds, so the north storehouse can be placed within the whole complex, from the main house to the smallest annex, in a single walk.