Aizanso Waiting Arbor

About the Aizanso Waiting Arbor

The Aizanso Waiting Arbor (愛山荘待合, Aizansō Machiai) is a single-storey timber Koshikake-machiai built around 1928 in the garden southwest of the tea house at Aizanso in Wakatake-cho, Echizen City, Fukui Prefecture. It was refitted in the later Showa period and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2017.

A koshikake machiai is a small roofed bench on the Roji, the garden path to a tea room, where invited guests sit and wait for the host to come and fetch them. This one is 3.0 metres long with a building area of 4.7 square metres and a sheet steel roof, which makes it the smallest of the registered structures at Aizanso.

The national database dates its refit to between 1966 and 1989.

Why it was registered

The Aizanso Waiting Arbor was registered for its contribution to the historic landscape.

Its roof is a Maneki-yane, with one slope carried further down than the other, and a lean-to is added behind the bench. It is built mostly of round logs, and the side wall has a Shitaji-mado, a window made by leaving the lattice under the plaster exposed. These are the vocabulary of sukiya design, and here they help set the scene along the path to the tea room.

What the national description dwells on is the placing. The arbor is turned slightly north relative to the tea house, so that a guest on the bench looks out over the garden. A very small building, but a carefully sited one.

What to look for

The angle

Notice how the Aizanso Waiting Arbor sits in relation to the tea house. It does not face it squarely but is turned a little to the north. Imagine yourself on the bench and follow your line of sight: the garden opens up in front of you.

The lattice window

The lattice window in the side wall lets a little light and air through. Together with the log posts and beams, it shows how sukiya builders made a finished space out of humble materials.

The roofline

From the side you can see the one long slope of the roof. With the lean-to behind the bench, it gives the arbor a low profile that settles it into the garden.

Seeing it

The Aizanso Waiting Arbor is an open structure in the garden, and its exterior can be seen from there. The official website does not say whether visitors may sit on the bench, so follow the staff's guidance.

Since it stands southwest of the tea house, look at the two together to understand the route of the tea path. Directions and opening hours are on the Aizanso page.