One House, Two Roofs
The Main House of the Sato Family Residence (佐藤家住宅主屋, also written Satō-ke Jūtaku Shuoku) is a large thatched farmhouse in the Izumi district of Fukushima City, Fukushima Prefecture, built in 1873 and entered on Japan's national register of tangible cultural properties on 24 December 2013.
It occupies the middle of a wide plot and faces south. The building covers 267 square metres, timber-framed, one storey with a partial upper floor tucked under the thatch.
Walk around it and the roof refuses to stay the same shape. Approach from the east and the thatch steps upward into a kabuto-zukuri profile, a stepped gable named for its likeness to a samurai helmet. Continue to the west side and the identical roof resolves into an irimoya, the hipped-and-gabled form usually reserved for temple halls and houses of standing. Riding the ridge between them is a koshi-yane, a small monitor roof raised to let smoke out and daylight in.
Two roof types on one building is not a compromise a carpenter reaches accidentally. Kabuto-zukuri is associated with the silk-raising country of northern Honshu, where families needed a ventilated upper floor for trays of silkworms, and the Shinobu and Date districts around Fukushima City were among the busiest silk areas in the country during the nineteenth century. Irimoya says something else entirely, about rank rather than work. The east face reads as a working farm; the west face reads as a household with position to display.
Why the Building Was Registered
Japan protects historic buildings at two levels. Designation, which produces National Treasures and Important Cultural Properties, applies to a small number of buildings and brings tight controls. Registration, introduced by a 1996 revision of the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties, is the lighter instrument: it covers buildings roughly fifty years old or more, leaves them in everyday use, and asks owners to notify the Agency for Cultural Affairs before making substantial changes to the exterior.
The Main House was registered under the criterion covering structures that contribute to the historic landscape of the country. Its registration number is 07-0144, granted in the seventy-sixth round of registrations.
Three companion buildings on the same property went onto the register the same day. The hanare, a detached wing of 1932, took number 07-0145. The bunko-gura, a document storehouse of 1875, took 07-0146. A miso storehouse of 1873, contemporary with the Main House itself, took 07-0147. Registering the four together rather than singly reflects how the Agency assessed them: not as four separate objects but as one surviving farmstead layout, of a kind that has thinned out sharply across the Fukushima basin.
The walls repay attention here. They are built shin-kabe, with the posts and the horizontal nuki tie-beams left exposed rather than plastered over, and the Agency's own description notes that the framing is displayed deliberately, as design rather than as structure that happened to remain visible.
What to Look For, and How Close You Can Get
Inside, the plan divides along an east-west line. The eastern portion holds the doma, the packed-earth working floor where farm tasks, cooking and the entrance all shared one continuous space. West of it the living rooms line up in sequence. The largest of them is the Butsuma, the room housing the family's Buddhist altar, and it is here that the heaviest timbers of the frame come into view, sized well beyond what the span strictly required.
A practical caution matters more than any of this. The Sato Family Residence is a private home. No public opening has been announced, no admission is charged, and there is no visitor facility of any kind. The Agency's record lists no owner name, which in this database usually indicates private ownership. Anyone travelling to Izumi should expect to see the thatched roof only over a fence or hedge from the adjoining public road, should not enter the grounds, and should keep cameras pointed away from windows and doorways.
Getting there is straightforward. The Fukushima Kotsu Iizaka Line leaves Fukushima Station and reaches Izumi Station in roughly ten minutes; Iwashiro-Shimizu, the stop before it, sits about 300 metres away and serves the same neighbourhood. The line continues north to Iizaka Onsen, a hot-spring town Matsuo Basho passed through in 1689. Near Iōji-mae Station, fifteen minutes on foot, stands Iō-ji, the temple of the medieval Satō warriors who followed Minamoto no Yoshitsune. No documented connection ties that clan to the household in Izumi, and Satō is the commonest surname in the prefecture, so the echo is best treated as coincidence.
Late autumn and winter show the roof at its clearest, once the surrounding foliage has dropped and the thatch stands out against bare fields.
- 📍 Plan Your Visit to Fukushima
- Find tours, activities & transport passes near Sato Family Residence Main House
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Q&A
- Where is the Sato Family Residence Main House and when was it built?
- It stands in the Izumi district of Fukushima City, Fukushima Prefecture, at Shimizuuchi 3, and was built in 1873, the sixth year of the Meiji era.
- Can visitors go inside the Sato Family Residence Main House?
- No. The building is a private residence with no announced public opening, no admission system and no visitor facilities. The exterior can be glimpsed from the public road, but the grounds are private and should not be entered.
- What makes the roof of the Sato Family Residence Main House unusual?
- The same thatched roof takes a stepped kabuto-zukuri form on the east gable and an irimoya hipped-and-gabled form on the west, with a small koshi-yane monitor roof at the centre of the ridge. Combining two roof types on one farmhouse is uncommon.
- How do you reach the Sato Family Residence in Izumi, Fukushima City?
- Take the Fukushima Kotsu Iizaka Line from Fukushima Station to Izumi Station, about ten minutes. Iwashiro-Shimizu Station, roughly 300 metres from Izumi, covers the same area.
- Is the Sato Family Residence in Fukushima City the same as the Sato residences in Akita or Iwate?
- No. Several unrelated properties share the name. The Sato Family Residence in Masuda, Yokote City, Akita Prefecture, and the one in Daisen City, Akita, are Important Cultural Properties; another registered Sato Family Residence stands in Senmaya, Ichinoseki City, Iwate. The Former Sato Family Residence in Kunimi, also in Fukushima Prefecture, is a separate prefecturally designated building.
Basic Information
| Name | Sato Family Residence Main House (佐藤家住宅主屋) |
|---|---|
| Location | Shimizuuchi 3, Izumi, Fukushima City, Fukushima Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure); registration no. 07-0144 |
| Year Designated | 24 December 2013 (76th registration round) |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Timber frame, one storey with partial second floor, thatched; building area 267 m² |
| Owner | No owner recorded in the Agency for Cultural Affairs database; privately held |
| Public Access | Not open to the public; exterior visible from the adjoining public road only |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Sato Family Residence Main House
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00009702
- Cultural Heritage Online: Sato Family Residence Main House
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/231811
- Fukushima City: List of Registered Tangible Cultural Properties (Structures)
- https://www.city.fukushima.fukushima.jp/soshiki/7/1032/2/1/3/725.html
- Fukushima Prefecture: Cultural Property Information
- https://www.pref.fukushima.lg.jp/site/edu/bunkazai01.html
Last verified: 2026.08.25