Kamikawa Warehouses (Kuraimu)

A city block of brick warehouses by Asahikawa Station

The Kamikawa Warehouses (上川倉庫群), known together as Kuraimu (蔵囲夢), are a group of brick warehouses and a timber office built between 1900 and 1913 on Miyashita-dori in Asahikawa City, Hokkaido; each of the seven buildings was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2001.

The site covers about 0.5 hectares, one full square of the city's street grid directly in front of JR Asahikawa Station, and the warehouses line its edges. The buildings still belong to Kamikawa Warehouse Co., Ltd. Since their conversion they have gone by the name Kuraimu, written with the characters for storehouse, enclose and dream, and they now hold galleries, a craft beer hall and a rehearsal room.

Built against the railway yard

Asahikawa Station opened in 1898, and the Kamikawa Warehouses went up right beside its yard. The Asahikawa Design Association describes them as a supply depot for the settlement of northern Hokkaido; the Agency for Cultural Affairs notes that they were first used to store grain.

Warehouse No. 2 came first, finished in 1900. No. 3 followed in 1903, Nos. 1 and 8 in 1904, and No. 10 in 1910. The office and Warehouse No. 11, the largest and last of the warehouses, were both completed in 1913.

At its peak in the early Taisho era the business ran 21 warehouses, and the design association says they stayed in use for storage until some point between 1965 and 1974. The seven registered buildings are the part that survived, still standing together as one block.

Small warehouses around a large one

The Kamikawa Warehouses present their front to Miyashita-dori, where the two-storey timber office stands near the middle. Warehouse No. 1 sits to its west and Warehouse No. 8 to its east. Both turn their long sides to the street, so brick runs almost unbroken along the pavement.

Warehouse No. 2 holds the north corner with its gable end to the street, and Warehouse No. 3 stands beside it at the west corner. Warehouse No. 10 meets No. 3 at a right angle across a passage and faces the station side. Warehouse No. 11 fills the centre of the block, closed in by the rest.

The design association points out that plenty of brick warehouses survive across Hokkaido, but a cluster of relatively small ones packed this tightly is rare. Walk the outside of the block first, then step into the central passage, and you feel how close together they stand.

Seven registered buildings

All seven buildings of the Kamikawa Warehouses were registered on November 20, 2001 (registration numbers 01-0038 to 01-0044, gazetted on December 4, 2001). The office was registered as a model of design, the six warehouses for their contribution to the historic landscape.

The office is a 2-storey Western-style building clad in weatherboarding, the only timber building on the site. The six warehouses are single-storey brick buildings with timber frames, ranging in building area from 165 square metres (Nos. 1, 2 and 8) to 430 square metres (No. 11).

The office and five of the warehouses have metal sheet roofs; No. 8 alone is tiled, with some metal sheet. The brickwork varies as well: the agency records English bond for No. 8 and stretcher bond for No. 10.

Visiting

The exteriors of the Kamikawa Warehouses can be seen from Miyashita-dori and from the passages inside the block. Getting indoors depends on which building is open at the time.

The Design Gallery in Warehouse No. 10 is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., closed on Mondays and over the New Year (December 30 to January 4), and admission is generally free. The Asahikawa Civic Gallery keeps the same 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. hours and closes from December 30 to January 4. Both host changing exhibitions, so they may be shut between shows.

The Daisetsu Ji Beer Hall in Warehouse No. 11 serves lunch from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and dinner from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. It closes on Sundays (it opens when the following Monday is a public holiday) and on December 31 and January 1. For the office and Warehouses Nos. 1, 2 and 8 we found no information on public access as of October 2026.

Opening days change from time to time, so check each venue's own website before you go.

Getting there

The Kamikawa Warehouses are about a 5-minute walk from JR Asahikawa Station, on Miyashita-dori, the street that runs east to west along the north side of the station. The Hokkaido Tourism Organization's travel site lists paid parking for 25 cars.

The registered address is 1604-1 and 1604-2 Miyashita-dori 11-chome; the beer hall gives its address as 1604-1 Miyashita-dori 11-chome.