A Shoreline Soy Sauce Brewer Since 1855
Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce (小豆島馬越醤油, Shōdoshima Umagoe Shōyu) is a soy sauce brewery founded in 1855 in Umagoe, Tonosho-cho, Shozu District, Kagawa Prefecture, where five structures on the lot, the processing hall, the north and south moromi storehouses, the tool storehouse and the chimney, were listed together as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties of Japan on March 18, 2003. The place name 馬越 is read Umagoe, not Magose.
The brewery's website says its trademark has been Yamaha since the business began, a name that has nothing to do with the piano maker. The site is run jointly by Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Limited Partnership and Yamaha Shokuhin Co., Ltd., and it notes that the firm makes tsukudani, small fish and seaweed simmered down in its own soy sauce, as well as the sauce itself.
It also describes how the sauce is made. Soybeans, wheat and salt become moromi, a thick fermenting mash, which rests in cedar vats in the storehouses for more than a year before being pressed slowly through 400 filter cloths. The brewery says a brewing storehouse built in the Edo period is still used for that long fermentation.
The Agency for Cultural Affairs describes the processing hall as the central building put up in 1888, when the brewing company was formally established. Roughly three decades after the first batches, the business took corporate form and built a new core for its works.
Five Listings on One Day
The five Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce listings carry consecutive registration numbers, 37-0151 to 37-0155, and were gazetted on April 8, 2003 in the 36th round of registrations. Tonosho Town's own list of designated and registered cultural properties shows the five together under Umagoe.
Two criteria apply. The north and south moromi storehouses were registered as models of architectural design; the processing hall, the tool storehouse and the chimney were registered for contributing to the historic landscape of the nation.
The dates run from the late Edo period to 1908. The north moromi storehouse and the tool storehouse are the oldest, both thought to date from the years when brewing began. The processing hall followed in 1888, the south moromi storehouse in 1901 (its ridge-raising year is known from records), and the chimney in 1908.
The Agency classes the four buildings as architecture and the chimney as a structure, counting four as 1 building each and the chimney as 1 unit.
Old Storehouses by the Sea, Works in the Middle
Pieced together from the Agency's notes, the layout is simple: the Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce lot fronts the sea, and the founding-era storehouses sit closest to the shore.
The north moromi storehouse runs east to west along the seaward side, with the south moromi storehouse directly behind it. Both are long single-storey buildings with ridges running east to west; the southern one is slightly shorter. The tool storehouse, a small earthen building, stands northwest of the processing hall, also near the shore.
A brick chimney rises near the middle of the lot, and the processing hall stretches east to west just south of it. The Agency notes that chimney and hall together give the site the look of a modern brewing works.
In Japanese soy sauce making, pressing the matured moromi, heating the raw sauce and finishing it for sale are together called seisei, and the processing hall's name, seisei-ba, appears to come from that stage. Keep the two roles in mind as you look around: moromi storehouses for the long rest, a Meiji works for the finishing. The Edo storehouses and the Meiji buildings then read as parts of a single production line.
Visiting and Getting There
Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce is still a working brewery, and none of the five buildings is open to the public. It does not appear on the Japan Soy Sauce Brewers' Association list of factory tours, and no published offer of visits could be found. Expect to see the buildings only from outside the property. Enquiries go to Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Limited Partnership, tel. 0879-65-2220.
Please stay off the premises and take photographs from the public road, keeping clear of work vehicles and traffic. The 15-meter chimney shows above the rooftops and is the easiest landmark as you approach.
By public transport, take the Tonosho Town bus on the Shikai Line from Tonosho Port to its terminus, Umagoe-hama, about 30 minutes. Under the timetable revised on April 1, 2026, buses leave Tonosho Port only four times a day, at 7:00 a.m., 8:28 a.m., 11:50 a.m. and 5:20 p.m., and there are just four return runs from Umagoe-hama, so check the return times before setting out. Timetable enquiries go to the Tonosho Town Planning and Finance Division (0879-62-7014) or Shodoshima Kotsu (0879-62-1203).
Check a local map for the walk from the Umagoe-hama stop to the brewery.
References
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, Database of National Cultural Properties: Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Processing Hall
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003324
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, Database of National Cultural Properties: Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce North Moromi Storehouse
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003325
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, Database of National Cultural Properties: Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce South Moromi Storehouse
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003326
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, Database of National Cultural Properties: Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Tool Storehouse
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003327
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, Database of National Cultural Properties: Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Chimney
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003328
- Tonosho Town: Cultural Properties of Tonosho (Japanese)
- https://www.town.tonosho.kagawa.jp/gyosei/soshiki/shogai/1/2543.html
- Tonosho Town: Shikai Line Town Bus Timetable (Japanese)
- https://www.town.tonosho.kagawa.jp/gyosei/soshiki/kikaku/1/3712.html
- Yamaha Shokuhin / Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce official website (Japanese)
- https://www.yamaha.org/
- Japan Soy Sauce Brewers' Association: Factory Tour List, Shikoku (Japanese)
- https://www.soysauce.or.jp/project/factory/list?area=shikoku
Last verified: 2026.09.29
Basic Information
| Name | Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce |
|---|---|
| Location | 161 Maehama-ko, Umagoe, Tonosho-cho, Shozu-gun, Kagawa Prefecture |
| Owner | Shodoshima Umagoe Soy Sauce Limited Partnership |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Properties (5) |
| Coordinates | 34.52166, 134.21084 |
