Fukunishi Honten

Black walls on an Aizu shopping street

Fukunishi Honten is a merchant family's compound in Nakamachi, Aizuwakamatsu City, Fukushima Prefecture, where seven buildings and structures raised between 1886 and 1930 were listed as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on 5 December 2019. Six are buildings and one is a structure. The property now belongs to Aizuwakamatsu Machizukuri Co., Ltd.

What people notice first is the colour. The Misegura shop storehouse facing Noguchi Hideyo Seishun-dori is finished not in white Shikkui plaster but in black, so the wall changes colour for the length of this one frontage.

The plot is narrow at the street and long behind it, the standard shape of a town merchant's holding. The shop storehouse and the sodegura side storehouse stand on the street, the main house behind them, a storehouse absorbed into the main house beyond that, the zashikigura and a brick wall along the north edge, and a detached wing to the east. Trade at the front, living in the middle, reception rooms at the back.

Storehouses first, house afterwards

Line the seven dates up and the family's course becomes readable. The oldest are three Dozo-zukuri storehouses of 1886: the sodegura, the zashikigura and the storehouse inside the main house. Then come the shop storehouse of about 1914, the main house and brick wall of about 1915, and the detached wing of about 1930.

Building the storehouses first and the house later is the order a merchant family followed: secure the goods, then rebuild the front. Six of the seven were repaired in 2016.

The listing criteria differ between them. The shop storehouse, main house, zashikigura, main house storehouse and detached wing were listed as models of design; the sodegura and the brick wall for contributing to the historic landscape. The first judgement is about how the buildings are made, the second about what the street sees.

Black plaster, Ionic columns, 35 mats

Inside the shop storehouse, Ionic columns stand at the line of the lean-to roof. A Western capital appears in a thick-walled Japanese shop front. The threshold beam is cut to a curve at the corners, the ceiling timbers are finished in clear Urushi lacquer, and above are an eight-mat room and a Western-style room. A signboard stand rises on the lean-to at the front.

The ground floor of the main house turns on the counting room, enclosed in glazed screens. The proprietor's room lies north, the service rooms south, and a corridor runs past the detached wing to an outside privy east of the zashikigura. Upstairs, three reception rooms totalling 35 Tatami mats are set at right angles to one another.

The zashikigura is a storehouse from outside and a formal room within, fitted with alcove, shelves and a study bay. It is one room today, but was originally three, with those fittings in the middle one. The timber is lacquered, the doors are double leaves in black plaster, and the lower wall outside is boarded.

The brick wall along the north edge runs 12 metres on a cut-stone base, laid in English bond English bond and capped with roof tiles. It stands high where it passes the sodegura and the proprietor's room and drops lower along the courtyard. Why the height changes becomes obvious once you look up from the courtyard itself.

Visiting

Fukunishi Honten is open to visitors. Admission is 500 yen for adults, with reductions for school pupils and groups. Opening hours run from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., with last entry at 4:30 p.m., and the house closes on Wednesdays.

From December to March the hours shorten to 10:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m., with last entry at 3:30 p.m. In that season the house closes on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and over the New Year period.

The postal address is 4-16 Nakamachi, Aizuwakamatsu City; the Agency for Cultural Affairs records the older cadastral form, 321 Nakamachi and others. It is about 20 minutes on foot from JR Aizu-Wakamatsu Station, or a short walk from the Nanukamachi area served by the town loop bus. There is no car park of its own, so drivers use the paid car parks nearby.

This information was checked on 17 September 2026. Hours and fees change, so confirm on the official site before travelling.