Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse

About the Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse

The Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse (阿部家住宅石蔵, Abe-ke Jūtaku Ishigura) is a two-storey stone storehouse built in the early Taisho era (1912 to 1926) between the main house and the silkworm storehouse on the Abe family estate in Kayaba, Sasagino, Fukushima City, Fukushima Prefecture, and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2008.

The Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse measures 9.6 by 4.8 metres, a building area of 46 m², with its ridge running east to west. The roof is an Okiyane, set clear of the walls and covered in sheet metal. On the west side a sheet-metal eave (Hisashi) shelters the door.

One Stone Store Among Clay Ones

Five of the six storehouses on the estate are dozo, built with thick layers of clay. Only this one has walls of stone, and the national database records its structure plainly as stone.

The family added a stone store to a yard of Meiji clay storehouses in the early Taisho years, and at the end of the same era put up the brick-faced brick storehouse. Each new store seems to have brought a new material with it.

The Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse was registered for its contribution to the historic landscape. Standing just behind the street-front silkworm storehouse, it adds a stone face to the view from the road.

Tuff Blocks and a King Post Truss

The walls are built of cut blocks of tuff, a soft stone formed from volcanic ash. It is easy to dress and resists fire, which made it a common choice for storehouses.

A projecting drip course runs along the base of the walls, and the band at the top of the walls, the Hachimaki, is also of stone. On a clay storehouse that band would be modelled in plaster; here it is cut stone. Both gables have windows on the upper floor.

The roof is carried on a king post truss, a Western-style frame with a central post and triangulated members that spread through Japan after the Meiji Restoration. Stone walls paired with an imported roof frame make this very much a storehouse of the early Taisho years.

Seeing the Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse

The Abe Family Residence Stone Storehouse belongs to a private home and its interior is not open. Fukushima Prefecture's heritage list also states that interior photography is not permitted, so the roof truss cannot currently be seen.

It stands west of the silkworm storehouse, that is, behind it as seen from the road. Only parts of the stone walls and gable windows may be visible past the street-front store. Please photograph only from the public road. Directions are on the Abe Family Residence page.