Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence

The Fence Named for Its Gaps

Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence encloses the sanctuary of Miyazaki Shrine in the Jingu district of Miyazaki City, was built in 1907, and was listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in January 2010. Its name says what it does: sukima means a gap, and this is a fence built to be looked through rather than to obstruct.

It runs 88 meters. Beginning at the north faces of the food-offering hall and the imperial rest house, it curves around the sanctuary in a half-octagon, meeting each of its angles with a straight run. That geometry is the point. A rectangular enclosure would have given the sanctuary four faces and four corners; the half-octagon gives it a shallow arc, so the building at the centre is held rather than boxed.

The fence is the innermost of the barriers on this axis, and the last thing standing between a visitor and the sanctuary. Round columns rise from a masonry plinth and are locked by a ground sill together with ties at waist and door-head height. Below the ties the infill is boarding; above them, openings fitted with Renji-mado, vertical wooden lattice. Toward the southern end, a pair of board doors opens as the only way in.

Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence dates from 1907. It is the innermost line of enclosure on this axis, and all 88 meters of it are spent on wrapping a single building.

Light Handling, Carefully Made

Registration number 45-0061 was entered on 15 January 2010 and gazetted on 3 February, under the criterion that the structure contributes to the historic landscape of the nation.

The official description of Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence closes on two judgements that are rarely paired: the design is light in handling, and the workmanship is careful. Lightness, in a fence that must enclose the most sacred ground on the site, is a choice against instinct. The obvious way to protect a sanctuary is with mass. What was built instead is a screen of thin vertical members carried on an armed eaves bracket so shallow that the roofline barely reads as a roof.

The lattice is what makes this work. From outside, the vertical bars close up into a near-solid surface when you stand at an angle; step square to any run and they open, and the sanctuary appears in slices behind them. The fence changes from barrier to screen depending on where you stand, which is a considerable amount of behaviour to get from a row of sticks.

What to Look For

Walk the arc rather than viewing it from one spot. Because Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence is a half-octagon, each straight run presents itself square-on for only a few paces before the angle turns you. The view through the lattice opens and closes as you move, and the rhythm of that opening is the main thing the fence has to offer.

Look at the junctions with the neighbouring buildings. The fence does not simply run up against the food-offering hall and the imperial rest house; it begins at their north faces, so the enclosure is formed jointly by fence and buildings. Those two structures are doing double duty as walls.

Look at the eaves. An arm projects from the upper part of each column to carry a boarded soffit, and the whole assembly is shallow enough that it throws only a thin band of shadow. Compare it with the fence down at the main gate, which carries a proper battened copper roof with rounded caps. Two fences on the same site, built in the same year to the same design intelligence, solve the covering problem in opposite ways.

Find the doors at the southern end. A pair of board doors set in the run marks the only opening. They are closed to visitors, but their position tells you how the enclosure is meant to be entered, and by whom.

Visiting Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence

Miyazaki Shrine Sukimagaki Fence is viewed from its outer face. The ground it encloses is not accessible and the pair of board doors toward the southern end is not a visitor entrance, but the fence itself can be approached and followed wherever paths allow.

The ground inside the fence is not accessible, and the board doors are not an entrance for visitors. What you can do is approach the enclosure from the front and follow its outer face where paths allow, which is enough to read the lattice, the boarding below it and the shallow eaves.

No restriction on ordinary photography is published. Overcast days suit this structure better than bright ones: strong sun flattens the lattice into a dark band, while diffused light keeps the individual bars readable.

Directions to the precinct and its opening hours are set out on the Miyazaki Shrine page.