Ushioda Family Residence Sodegura: The Tall Wing Storehouse of Tsuruya
Beside the black-plastered shopfront of the Ushioda family in Makabe stands a narrower, markedly taller building that turns its gable end toward the street. Visitors often step back to fit it into a photograph and find they still cannot. This is the sodegura, literally the sleeve storehouse, an annex that grew out from the main shop the way a sleeve extends from a robe.
The Ushioda traded in kimono cloth and dry goods under the house name Tsuruya, in the old merchant town of Makabe below the northern face of Mt. Tsukuba. Their sodegura was completed in 1912, the forty-fifth and final year of the Meiji era, two years after the adjoining misegura shop. Where the shop presents a long wall to the road, the sodegura shows only its gable, a vertical accent that gives the corner its distinctive rhythm.
The two buildings were conceived to be read together. A double-leaf door, the kind called kannon-biraki after the hinged doors of a Buddhist altar, opens from the sodegura toward the accounting floor of the shop next door, so that goods could pass between selling space and storage without crossing the street. Matched in height and wall line, shop and wing form a single merchant frontage rather than two separate structures.
Why the Building Is Registered
The sodegura was listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in November 1999 under registration number 08-0018, one of four Ushioda structures recognised at the same time. The criterion applied is that a building be difficult to reproduce, and the sodegura qualifies less for isolated grandeur than for the role it plays in a complete merchant composition.
Its structure repays attention. Built over two full storeys with a gabled roof of pantiles, the storehouse has an earthen-walled core clad on the outside in sasarago shitami, a batten-and-clapboard siding that sheds rain from the plaster beneath. The footprint is about 118 square metres, smaller than the shop but taller in profile. Officially the sodegura is classed under commerce rather than dwelling, a reminder that it was working architecture, built to hold the stock of a busy cloth business rather than to impress on its own.
What to Look For on a Visit
Look first at the join. The point where sodegura meets misegura shows how carefully the two were aligned, their eaves and wall planes carried across as one surface. Then look up. The height that defeats the camera was a deliberate signal of a prosperous house, and from the corner of Gojinya-mae-dori the gable rises like a marker above the street.
The clapboard siding is worth a close look as well. Unlike the smooth black plaster of the shop, the sodegura wears a textured skin of overlapping boards held by slender battens, a practical finish that also gives the wing a different character from its neighbour. During the Makabe Hina Matsuri in February and March the doors stand open and the interior can be seen, letting the visitor read the thickness of the walls and the scale of a space designed to keep bolts of silk safe from fire and damp.
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Q&A
- What does sodegura mean?
- The word means sleeve storehouse. It describes an annex that projects from a main building, much as a sleeve extends from a garment, and here it adjoins the family's shop.
- How does the sodegura differ from the shop next to it?
- The shop shows a broad plastered wall to the street, while the sodegura turns its gable end forward and rises noticeably taller. Its outer walls are clad in clapboard rather than smooth black plaster.
- When was it built?
- It was completed in 1912, the last year of the Meiji era, about two years after the neighbouring shop storehouse.
- What is the double door facing the shop for?
- It is a kannon-biraki, a pair of hinged leaves that opens toward the shop's accounting floor. Goods could move between the selling area and storage through this opening.
- Can the interior be seen?
- The doors are often opened during the Makabe Hina Matsuri each February and March, when much of the Ushioda house is accessible to visitors.
Basic Information
| Name | Ushioda Family Residence Sodegura (Ushioda-ke jūtaku sodegura) |
|---|---|
| Location | 189 Makabe, Makabe-machi, Sakuragawa City, Ibaraki Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (building), reg. no. 08-0018 |
| Registered | 18 November 1999 |
| Built | 1912 (Meiji 45) |
| Structure | Two-storey earthen-walled construction with clapboard siding, gabled pantile roof, floor area approx. 118 m², 1 building |
| Setting | Adjoins the Ushioda misegura within the Makabe preservation district |
References
- Cultural Heritage Online — Ushioda Family Residence Sodegura
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/166712
- Agency for Cultural Affairs National Cultural Properties Database
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00001402
- Ibaraki Prefectural Board of Education — Ushioda Family Residence Misegura and three others
- https://kyoiku.pref.ibaraki.jp/bunkazai/bunkazai-registered-6510/
Last verified: 2026.07.06