Senzai Family Residence

Senzai Family Residence

The Senzai Family Residence (千歳家住宅) in Awabashicho, Fushimi Ward, Kyoto City, is the house of a timber-merchant family, centred on a main house built in 1869; the main house, the annex, the old storehouse and the new storehouse were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on June 28, 2017 (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Their registration numbers run in sequence from 26-0522 to 26-0525.

The family name 千歳 is read Senzai here, not Chitose. The Agency gives the reading senzai-ke jūtaku, and Kyoto City refers to the same house as Senzai-tei.

According to Kyoto City, the Senzai were timber merchants in Fushimi, a town that grew on river and canal traffic. The city describes the house as keeping the bold exterior of an early Meiji townhouse and as an essential part of the canal-side landscape of Fushimi, once a hub of water transport.

How the Estate Is Laid Out

The main house of the Senzai Family Residence faces east onto the road along the west side of the Horikawa canal (濠川) (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Behind it to the west, a covered corridor leads to the annex; north of the annex stands the old storehouse, and north of that the new storehouse. A large street-front townhouse, a guest annex and two storehouses make up the whole.

The four buildings date from different decades: the main house from 1869, the old storehouse from the early Meiji period (1868 to 1882), the new storehouse from 1927 and the annex from 1933 (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

Both storehouses stand on stone foundations built against flooding (Agency for Cultural Affairs), a plain sign of how close the estate lies to the water. The structure and details of each building are covered on its own page.

Recognition by Kyoto City

Separately from its national registration, Kyoto City designated the Senzai Family Residence, under the name Senzai-tei, as a Landscape Important Building (No. 61) in 2012 and as a Building of Historic Character (No. 39) on December 26 of the same year (Kyoto City). It also appears on the city's list of buildings with historic design in Fushimi.

The list in the city's historic landscape plan also dates the Senzai Family Residence to 1869, matching the Agency's record.

Visiting

No official information on interior access to the Senzai Family Residence was found. The front of the main house faces the road on the west side of the Horikawa, so the exterior can be seen from the street; please view it without entering the property.

The nearest station is Chushojima on the Keihan Main Line; measured from the coordinates in the Agency's database, the house lies about 700 metres north-west of it in a straight line. From Fushimi-Momoyama Station on the same line it is about 800 metres west. Allow 10 to 15 minutes on foot from either.