Former Sasanami Family Residence (Kaminokuni Town, Hiyama

A Fishing Family's House on the Sea of Japan Coast

On a narrow strip of land between the shore and a steep hillside in Kaminokuni, southern Hokkaido, stands a low wooden house with a plank roof held down by rows of stones. This is the Former Sasanami Residence, the home of a family that grew prosperous from the herring fishery. Its main house dates to the early 19th century and is counted among the oldest surviving private dwellings anywhere in Hokkaido.

The setting tells you much about how people lived here. The plot sits along the approach to Kaminokuni Hachiman Shrine, which divides it into two: the main house on the east side, the storehouses on the west. Behind the buildings the ground rises sharply, and in front lies the sea that gave the family its livelihood.

From a Notō Village to the Northern Fishing Grounds

The Sasanami family traced its beginnings to Sasanami village in Notō Province, in what is now Suzu City, Ishikawa Prefecture. During the Kyōhō era (1716–1736) the first head of the line crossed to Matsumae Fukuyama on the southern tip of Hokkaido, then moved to Kaminokuni. Each generation took the name Kyūemon, and the family worked as amimoto, the owners of a herring net operation who organized the seasonal catch and the workers who brought it in.

The house that survives today was built by the fifth Kyūemon. A family document called the Katoku Fushin-bikae records that the foundations were replaced in 1857 and the roof re-laid the following year, which has helped scholars place the original construction in the first half of the 1800s. Around 1893, when the road in front was widened, the front of the house was pulled back by roughly 90 centimeters, but the building otherwise keeps its early form.

Why the House Is Protected

In 1990, after roughly 150 years in the family's hands, the residence was donated to the town of Kaminokuni. Two years later, in 1992, the main house and an attached earthen-walled storehouse were designated Important Cultural Properties of Japan. The reasoning was straightforward: as the oldest fishing-family dwelling still standing in Hokkaido, the house is a rare physical record of how the herring trade shaped life along this coast.

Its influence outlasted the building's own century. The form of the Sasanami house is regarded as the model for the nishin-banya, the large herring-fishery lodges that later spread along Hokkaido's Sea of Japan shore and that still survive in scattered places today.

A second designation came in December 2018, when the rice storehouse and document storehouse on the site were added to the listing. Built in 1848, these two structures had been dismantled and stored in 1991, then rebuilt in 2002. They share a single earthen-walled, two-story body with a gabled tile roof, the document store on the north and the rice store on the south, and their roof underlayer uses a birch-bark technique characteristic of Hokkaido.

What to Look For

The roof repays a close look. Rather than tile or thatch, the main house carries split shingles of hiba, the cypress that grows in the region, weighted down with stones against the sea wind. Hiba was also used for much of the timber inside, and its scent still lingers in the rooms.

Step into the earthen-floored doma and you reach the part of the house where the hired fishermen once gathered. This working space, set against the family's living rooms, shows how a single building had to serve both as a home and as the headquarters of a fishery. The front room is the mise; deeper in lies the formal zashiki.

Inside the buildings, the town has assembled a collection that reaches well beyond the house itself. Among the objects on view are Enkū Buddhas carved by the wandering monk-sculptor, old coins, and the kind of household goods a fishing family would have used. The storehouse displays carry the story further: Ainu ritual implements known as ikupasuy, bows, ceremonial spear-shaped objects, and a wooden cargo tag said to be the only one found in Hokkaido with legible writing. A video corner follows the route of Sugae Masumi, the traveler who recorded southern Hokkaido more than two centuries ago.

Getting There and Nearby Sites

Kaminokuni lies about an hour and forty minutes by car from Hakodate, on a coast that holds some of the few medieval sites in Hokkaido. The residence is open from spring through autumn; in 2026 the season runs from April 11 to November 8, with hours from 10:00 to 16:00 and closures on Mondays. Admission is 300 yen for adults and 100 yen for students.

Several places of interest sit within easy reach. Directly beside the residence is Kaminokuni Hachiman Shrine, whose main hall is a Hokkaido-designated cultural property, and the main hall of Jōkokuji temple nearby is itself an Important Cultural Property. A short distance away are the ruins of Katsuyama-date, a national Historic Site from the medieval period, with its own guidance facility. Mount Iō above the town is known for azaleas, and a festival is held there in June when they bloom.