Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building

What Is the Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building?

The Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building (信洋舎製紙所旧塵取場及び仕上場棟, Shin'yōsha Seishijo Kyū-chiritoriba oyobi Shiageba-tō) is a two-storey timber workshop in Sadatomo-cho, Echizen City, Fukui Prefecture, built in 1899 and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2020.

According to the Agency for Cultural Affairs, the ground floor was the chiritoriba, where debris was picked out of the raw fiber, and the upper floor was the shiageba, where paper was finished into saleable products.

The plan is long and slim, about 18 m long (Ketayuki) and about 5.5 m deep (Harima), with a building area of 101 m². The Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building adjoins the north side of the Boiler and Former Roller Room Building.

Why the Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building Was Registered

The Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building was registered for contributing to the historic landscape of the country. The Agency describes it as the building that handled the final stage of production in a paper industry rooted in the local area.

What sets it apart is that the first and last stages of the work are stacked on top of each other. Fiber cleaning on the ground floor comes before the vat: soaked fiber is combed through for specks and debris. Finishing upstairs comes at the very end, once the paper has been dried and glazed. Read against the report's note that the four buildings follow the order of the work, the sequence starts in this building, passes through the other three, and returns here to finish.

The building is firmly dated to 1899, thirteen years after the 1886 drying building. By then the mill had added a dedicated home for both the entry and the exit of its process.

What to Look For

Both floors of the Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building are single open rooms lined with continuous glass windows for light and air, a feature the Agency singles out. Fiber cleaning means finding tiny flecks by eye in wet fiber, and finishing means checking the surface of each sheet. Windows on both levels suit two jobs that depend on good light.

At about 5.5 m deep, the building is shallow enough for daylight to reach the far side of the room from the windows. The Agency's description also makes clear that the full 18 m length was used as one undivided workspace on each floor.

The name marks only the fiber cleaning room as former, yet the Agency describes both floors in the past tense. The sources consulted do not say how either floor is used today.

Visiting the Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building

The Shinyosha Paper Mill Former Fiber Cleaning and Finishing Building stands inside the working mill, and its interior is not open to the public. To ask about seeing it, contact the mill by email in advance. Past RENEW open-factory tours are the only documented occasion when the workshop opened, and it is not known if they reached this building.

If you are shown inside, leave fiber and unfinished paper untouched, and ask before taking photographs. Directions to the mill are on the Shinyosha Paper Mill page.