Horiguchi Family Residence Main House

The Family's Living Quarters Behind the Shop

The Horiguchi Family Residence Main House (堀口家住宅主屋, Horiguchi-ke Jūtaku Shuoku) is a two-storey timber dwelling of about 1866 standing behind the shop storehouse of the Horiguchi hardware merchants' compound in Kaminocho, Shibukawa City, Gunma Prefecture, and it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 4 December 2000.

It stands on the south side of the shop, with its ridge parallel to the shop's. The roof is a Kirizuma-zukuri gable, entered from the long side in the Hirairi manner, and the building area is 70 square metres. Where the shop at the front was the place of trade, the Horiguchi Family Residence Main House was where the family lived.

Why It Was Registered: A Regional Merchant-House Type

The Horiguchi Family Residence Main House was registered as a model of its building type. The Agency for Cultural Affairs notes that it has been altered, but values it for showing how the living quarters of merchant houses in this region were laid out.

The shop stands on the street as a separate fireproof building, and the house sits behind it under its own roof. At the Horiguchi compound both halves of that arrangement were built around the same time and survive together. Read closely, the official description is less about the main house as a design in its own right than about the pairing of dwelling and shop.

What to Look For: Kamite, Shimote and the Passage Through

The plan of the Horiguchi Family Residence Main House is easiest to understand as two halves, west and east. Seen from the shop, the right-hand, western half is the kamite, the upper side, and the eastern half is the shimote, the lower side.

The shimote was originally a Toriniwa, an earth-floored passage running straight through from front to back. It probably carried people and goods between the shop and the storehouses further back.

The roof was first covered in wooden boards and is now sheet metal. The house has been altered, but its division into kamite and shimote can still be read.

Visiting the Horiguchi Family Residence Main House

The Horiguchi Family Residence Main House is one of the buildings Horiguchi Co., Ltd. keeps as its former head office, the Misegura Kinenkan. No opening days or hours for the interior are published.

The house stands directly behind the shop on the road, and how much of it can be seen from the street has not been confirmed. Please do not peer past the shop or enter the grounds. The photographs in the Agency for Cultural Affairs database show the building if you want to see it.