Meiji

An 1887 seaside guest house at Futami near Ise, built in two months for an empress. A 120-mat hall and ornate rooms are highlights. Closed for restoration from 2026.

Built in 1895 and registered in 2014, the Asanokan Entrance Wing fronts Ise's Futami inn row with a hipped-and-gabled pantile roof and a projecting gabled porch.

The Asanokan Banquet Wing of 1895 holds an eighty-mat hall under a coved coffered ceiling, with a shoin-style alcove wall and a rear door onto the beach at Ise.

The Ishikawa Brewery South Bunko Storehouse is a Meiji-era earthen storehouse within the grounds of Ishikawa Brewery, a historic sake producer founded in 1830 in Yokkaichi City, Mie Prefecture. One of 15 structures registered as national Tangible Cultural Properties, this beautifully preserved bunko storehouse features white plaster walls and a cut-stone foundation. Discover the deep traditions of Japanese sake culture alongside the brewery's acclaimed Fukii sake, crafted with ultra-soft water from the Suzuka Mountains.

Discover Ito Ryokan Main Building, a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in Iga City, Mie Prefecture. This late Meiji-era wooden inn features exquisite coffered ceilings with phoenix paintings, black-lacquered frames, and refined chaya architecture in the heart of Iga Ueno's former entertainment district.

An early Meiji townhouse in Nabari's old quarter: bengara lattice front below a low tsushi-nikai upper storey. Registered 2017, private, seen from the street only.

An 1858 earthen-walled brewhouse in Yokkaichi, Mie, registered in 2025. Its brick chimney marks the kamaba, the room where rice is still steamed for sake.

A mid-Meiji storehouse in Yokkaichi, Mie: two parallel ranges built with no wall between them, forming one room. Registered in 2025, still used for brewing.

Built in 1888 as Ueno's police station and a model for police offices across Mie, this registered timber building in Iga reopened in 2026 as a free ceramics gallery.

An 1889 merchant house on Nabari's Hase highway, with a 15.8-metre frontage, plastered loft and lattice window. Registered in 2013, it fronts the Jikon brewery.

A Meiji-era two-storey villa wing in Yokkaichi, Mie, built for spinning magnate Ito Denshichi X. Its east-facing carriage porch survives; registered in 2010.

Discover the Former Funaki Bridge, a registered tangible cultural property spanning the pristine Miyagawa River gorge in Mie Prefecture. Built in 1905 with distinctive brick piers and later retrofitted with steel Warren trusses, this historic bridge showcases Japan's Meiji-era engineering heritage.

Selling the same pilgrim medicine since 1676, this early Meiji merchant house on Ise's Geku approach keeps its curved gable, ribbed boarding and latticed upper bay.

Attached to the main hall of a Suzuka temple, this small early Meiji shoin was named by the haiku poet Yamaguchi Seishi, who held verse gatherings in its four rooms.

An 1868 townhouse in Suzuka, Mie, where the poet Sasaki Nobutsuna was born in 1872. Registered in 2011, it keeps the through-passage plan of an Ishiyakushi machiya.

An 1875 plastered storehouse of 14 square metres behind Sasaki Nobutsuna's birthplace in Suzuka, Mie, registered in 2011 for its part in the old post-town scene.

This early Meiji retaining wall in Matsusaka, Mie, runs 48 metres in undressed river cobbles, with a recess collecting spring water. Registered in 2013.

An early Meiji house on the Wakayama Kaido in Matsusaka, Mie, this 172-square-metre home of a medicine dealer was listed as a Cultural Property in 2013.

Set on the cobble wall along the east edge of a Matsusaka compound in Mie, this Meiji plastered wall runs 16 metres, its ridge stepping down midway. Listed 2013.

Explore Japan's first private museum, the Jingu Chokokan, a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in Ise. Admire Renaissance-style Meiji architecture by Katayama Tokuma, and discover sacred treasures from Ise Grand Shrine's 1,300-year-old Shikinen Sengu ceremony.