Hekiunso (Former Kumamoto Family Residence) Gate

The Front Gate of Hekiunso

The Hekiunso (Former Kumamoto Family Residence) Gate (碧雲荘（旧熊本家住宅）門) is the front gate of a hilltop residence of about 1941 in Ishida-nishifure, Ishida-cho, Iki City, Nagasaki Prefecture, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (structure) on October 7, 2014 (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

The Agency records a timber gate 7.6 metres wide, roofed in tile and partly in copper sheet, with walls on either side; registration number 42-0112.

A Three-Bay Bracket Gate

The Hekiunso gate stands southeast of the main house, a three-bay Udekimon, the type of gate whose roof rests on projecting brackets (Agency for Cultural Affairs). The gabled roof is laid with pantiles, while the eaves and the verge boards at the gable ends are finished in flat copper sheet. Round main posts carry the purlins on paired brackets, a rear support post stands behind the central bay, and the eaves have a single layer of widely spaced rafters.

The doors are single planks of Yakusugi, the old-growth cedar of Yakushima. The side bays have transoms above and hold wicket doors, and flanking walls run off to either side (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Nagasaki Prefecture describes three doorways across the three bays, double doors in the centre and single doors at the sides, and main posts 1 shaku 2 sun (about 36 centimetres) across.

Why It Was Registered

The Agency calls it a front gate of grand proportions and registered it for its contribution to the historic landscape. It stands where the climb from the south entrance ends, forming the face of the hilltop estate (Nagasaki Prefecture).

Where the Timber Came From

Nagasaki Prefecture quotes a local history of Kumamoto Rihei, which says the posts are logs of Taiwan cypress and the door boards single pieces of Yakusugi with fine, close growth rings. According to the same book, the beam along the eaves was felled at Sagano in Kyoto, floated down the Katsura and Yodo rivers and loaded onto a ship at Osaka for the voyage to the island.

What to Look For

Get close to the Yakusugi doors to see the grain and the growth rings (Agency for Cultural Affairs; Nagasaki Prefecture). Look up and you will see the thin line of copper sheet edging the tiled roof. The thickness of the round posts and the central support post gives the gate its weight.

Visiting

According to Iki City's answer to the city council in September 2025, the Hekiunso gate can be viewed freely by entering from the rear entrance on the Indōji side. It stands at the top of a climb of about 70 metres from the south entrance, looking down over the Iki Channel to the south (Nagasaki Prefecture). No official information on photography was found.