Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum

What Is Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum?

Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum (仁和寺霊宝館, Reihokan) is a museum building completed in 1927 near the center of the grounds of Ninnaji in Omuro-Ouchi, Ukyo Ward, Kyoto City, and it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on October 28, 2011.

Ninnaji holds a large collection of Buddhist statues, paintings, sutras and documents, headed by the Amida triad said to be the temple's original principal image. The Reihokan was built to store and display them; the temple's multilingual commentary names housing the art and statuary handed down since the founding as one of its purposes.

Unlike the timber halls of the palace compound, Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum is built of reinforced concrete. For a temple that had lost its palace to fire in 1887, protecting the collection from flames was the museum's first job, and the choice of structure follows directly from that.

Why Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum Is Registered

The criterion was serving as a model of design. The museum is a 2-storey reinforced concrete building with a pantile (Sangawara-buki) roof and a building area of 376 square metres. It is arranged around a central court, like a hollow square, with a gabled (kirizuma) porch projecting from the middle of the south front.

What the Agency for Cultural Affairs singles out is the treatment of the outer walls. Azekura storehouses, the log-built treasuries in which temples and shrines have kept their valuables since ancient times, stack timbers of triangular section to form their walls. The Reihokan reproduces those horizontal ridges in concrete.

It also shows rafters (Taruki) and curved tie beams (Kōryō) on the outside, translating the parts of a wooden temple building into a new material. The Agency calls it a fine example of Japanese-style expression in concrete. Borrowing the look of the traditional treasure storehouse for a modern treasure house was a clever idea.

Highlights: The Ridged Walls and the Guardians at the Door

Stand in front of the south porch and look along the walls at an angle. The storehouse ridges cast stronger shadows seen obliquely than head-on, and that is when they read most like stacked timber. The rafter ends under the eaves are easiest to follow from the same angle.

On the entrance doors are copper-sheet figures of Jikokuten and Komokuten, painted in color. According to the temple's commentary, they were made to complete the set of Four Heavenly Kings attending the Amida inside, which lacked these two, and they are thought to be the work of Kataoka Yasushi, an architect and designer. Jikokuten, guardian of the east, holds a sword; Komokuten, guardian of the west, holds a brush and a scroll.

Exhibitions change theme every season, and the temple says everything except the Buddhist statues is rotated.

Visiting Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum

Ninnaji Temple Treasure Museum is not open year-round; it opens for limited periods three times a year, in spring, summer and autumn. Dates and closing days vary from season to season, so check the temple's notices. Admission is 500 yen for adults and free for high school students and younger (as of September 2026).

During opening periods a combined ticket with the Ninnaji Palace Garden is available. Photography inside the museum is prohibited.

The museum stands on the east side of the main approach, on your right as you walk from the Nio-mon Gate toward the Chumon Gate, across the path from the Palace Garden. Even when it is closed you can see the exterior from the grounds.

Admission to the grounds as a whole and directions are covered on the Ninnaji Temple page.