Hekiunso (Former Kumamoto Family Residence)

Hekiunso, a Hilltop Estate on Iki

Hekiunso (Former Kumamoto Family Residence) (碧雲荘（旧熊本家住宅）) in Ishida-cho, Iki City, Nagasaki Prefecture, is the home that the businessman Kumamoto Rihei completed in 1941; its main house, gate and stone wall were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on October 7, 2014 (Agency for Cultural Affairs). The name is read Hekiunsō. The three entries carry the consecutive registration numbers 42-0111 to 42-0113, and all are owned by Iki City.

Hekiunso sits on high ground in the southeast of Iki, looking down on Indōji port (Nagasaki Prefecture). Iki lies in the strait between Kyushu and Tsushima, and from the house the view opens south across the Iki Channel.

Kumamoto Rihei and the Building of the Estate

Iki City gives this outline of its builder, Kumamoto Rihei (1876 to 1968). At 24 he went to the Korean Peninsula, and with backing from Japanese business leaders arranged through Matsunaga Yasuzaemon, a fellow islander, he bought about 4,000 chōbu of land and ran a farming estate. Back on Iki he paid for the breakwater at Indōji, gave the site and an assembly hall to Ishida Elementary School and made donations to Iki Girls' High School (Iki City Council minutes).

Work started with the stone wall. Nagasaki Prefecture says the ground was levelled from about the autumn of 1938, and the masonry took roughly a year from January 1939. The Agency dates the stone wall to 1940, the gate to about 1941 and the main house to 1941.

How the Estate Is Laid Out

The estate climbs in stages from a low entrance on the harbour side to the main house on the hilltop.

• Stone wall: cut basalt laid along the east part of the south edge of the site, running from the entrance to the east corner and up beside a ramp; unlike the other two, its lot lies in Indōji-ura (Agency for Cultural Affairs)
• Gate: a three-bay Udekimon gate southeast of the main house, at the top of a climb of about 70 metres from the south entrance (Agency for Cultural Affairs; Nagasaki Prefecture)
• Main house: a single-storey timber home with a hip-and-gable roof on the hilltop, its rooms arranged around a courtyard (Agency for Cultural Affairs)

The Agency registered the main house as a model of design, and the gate and stone wall for their contribution to the historic landscape. Nagasaki Prefecture rates Hekiunso highly as a lavish Japanese-style house of the early Showa era in good condition. Part of the house is now joined directly to the building of the Ishida General Welfare Center (Nagasaki Prefecture).

Iki City refers to Hekiunso together with Kauntei, a tea house on the same grounds, as the former residences of Kumamoto Rihei. The tea house is not part of the registration (Iki City Council minutes).

Visiting and Getting There

In an answer to the city council in September 2025, Iki City said that anyone may view the exterior of the main house, the gate and the stone wall by entering from the rear entrance on the Indōji side. To see inside the main house, visitors can contact the Ishida branch of the social welfare council, and no application form is needed. No official information on admission fees or opening hours was found.

From Kyushu, Kyushu Yusen ferries sail from Karatsu-Higashi port in Saga Prefecture to Indōji port; on the timetable from November 2026 the crossing takes about 1 hour 45 minutes. Hekiunso stands on the high ground above Indōji port (Nagasaki Prefecture). No official information on parking was found.