Scratch Tile and Stone: A Chemistry Building Turned Headquarters
Walk through the old main gate of Tohoku University's Katahira Campus in Sendai and one of the first large buildings you meet is a three-story block whose facade rises in emphatic vertical lines. This is the former Chemistry Department building of the Faculty of Science of Tohoku Imperial University, completed in 1932 with an extension added in 1935. Today it serves as Administration Building 1, the headquarters of the university, and since October 2017 it has been listed as a National Registered Tangible Cultural Property.
The building's most recognizable feature is its skin. The street-facing walls are covered in scratch tile, a type of facing tile scored with fine parallel grooves before firing. The technique spread across Japan in the 1920s and 1930s, partly through its use at Frank Lloyd Wright's Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, and it gives the surface a soft, fabric-like texture that shifts with the light. Recent construction on the campus has borrowed the same tile vocabulary, a quiet acknowledgment of how much this building defines the local scenery.
Verticality as a Design Statement
The registration citation, under the criterion of serving as a model of design, singles out the facade's vertical emphasis. Pilaster-like column forms project from the wall plane and run the full height of the building, dividing the elevation into repeated bays. At the central entrance the treatment intensifies: here the columns are clad in stone rather than tile, producing what the Agency for Cultural Affairs describes as a solemn appearance.
The plan is pragmatic. A corridor runs along the rear side of the building, and the laboratories and offices line the front, so the ornamented facade and the working rooms face the same direction. Originally the interior held conference rooms and chemistry laboratories in large numbers.
One note on dates. The national database records the building as completed in 1932 and extended in 1935, while university histories describe the chemistry classroom complex as having been built in stages beginning in 1927. The registered structure corresponds to the later phases of that campaign. Renovations in 2003 and 2013 fitted the building for administrative use without erasing the original entrance hall or the tilework.
Reading the Campus Through One Building
Because it now houses the university's central administration, the interior is not open to casual visitors. The exterior rewards attention, though, and Katahira Campus keeps its grounds open to the public under the university's long-standing open-door policy.
Try standing at the old main gate, itself registered as a cultural property, and looking down the avenue. The chemistry building's stone entrance answers the granite gate posts across a distance of a few hundred meters, and both date from the same interwar expansion of the imperial university. Then walk the perimeter and watch how the scratch tile catches the afternoon sun; the grooves read as shadow lines, and the whole wall seems to have grain, like sawn wood.
The campus is roughly a ten-minute walk from Aoba-dori Ichibancho or Itsutsubashi subway stations, or twenty-five minutes on foot from Sendai Station.
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Q&A
- Can I enter the building?
- No. It functions as Administration Building 1, the working headquarters of Tohoku University, so the interior is not open to the public. The exterior can be viewed freely on the open campus.
- What is scratch tile?
- A facing tile scored with fine parallel grooves before firing, popular in Japan in the 1920s and 1930s. It covers the street-facing walls of this building and gives the surface a textured, light-responsive finish.
- When was the building constructed?
- The national database lists completion in 1932 with an extension in 1935. University sources describe the wider chemistry complex as built in stages from 1927, with the registered structure belonging to the later phases.
- Why was it registered as a cultural property?
- It was registered in 2017 under the criterion of serving as a model of design, valued as a fine example of an early Showa-period university building with a strongly vertical facade and a stone-clad ceremonial entrance.
Basic Information
| Name | Former Chemistry Department Building, Faculty of Science, Tohoku Imperial University (Tohoku University Administration Building 1) |
|---|---|
| Location | 2-1-1 Katahira, Aoba Ward, Sendai City, Miyagi Prefecture |
| Designation | National Registered Tangible Cultural Property (registered October 27, 2017; registration no. 04-143) |
| Registration Criterion | Serving as a model of design |
| Structure | Reinforced concrete, three stories with partial basement; building area 871 square meters |
| Year Built | 1932 (Showa 7); extended 1935; renovated 2003 and 2013 |
| Owner | Tohoku University (National University Corporation) |
| Visiting | Exterior only; the interior serves as university headquarters and is not open to the public |
References
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, National Cultural Properties Database — Former Chemistry Department Building, Faculty of Science
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00011848
- Tohoku University — Registered Tangible Cultural Properties
- https://www.bureau.tohoku.ac.jp/somu/bunkazai/kenzobutsu/
- Tohoku University — Katahira Campus
- https://www.tohoku.ac.jp/japanese/profile/campus/01/katahira/
Last verified: 2026.07.02