Nakagawa Family Residence (Nara City)

About the Nakagawa Family Residence (Nara City)

The Nakagawa Family Residence (中川家住宅, Nakagawa-ke Jūtaku) is a townhouse compound built in 1915 in Imazushicho, Nara City, Nara Prefecture, whose five structures (main house, connecting corridor, annex, storehouse and brick wall) were entered on Japan's register of Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on December 19, 2014. Other registered properties share the Nakagawa name, so this site lists it as the Nakagawa Family Residence (Nara City).

The house stands west of Kintetsu Nara Station, on a narrow lane leading off Omiya-dori, the city's main east-west avenue. Its street front is a Machiya, the long, narrow townhouse that combined shop and home in Japanese merchant towns. Behind it, a corridor and an annex enclose a small courtyard, a storehouse fills the far west of the plot, and a brick wall runs along the southern edge. Today the Nakagawa residence also operates as Machiya Imazushi, a venue for private, reservation-only cultural programs.

How the Nakagawa Family Came to Imazushicho

According to Nara City and Nara Prefecture, the Nakagawa were textile merchants who had been in business in Nara since the late 18th century. In 1914, construction of the Osaka Electric Tramway's Nara terminus (today's Kintetsu Nara Station) displaced them from Higashimuki-nakamachi, and they moved to the present site in Imazushicho, where they kept up the weaving business until the years before the Second World War. The Agency for Cultural Affairs dates the main house, corridor and storehouse to 1915, the year after the move.

Nara City praises the Nakagawa Family Residence as a fine Taisho-era townhouse that keeps the traditional form of Naramachi houses, and adds that the story of its construction, prompted by the coming of the railway, makes it a document of Nara's modern history in its own right. The prefectural database notes that papers recording the move survive with the house.

Machiya Imazushi tells the story a little differently. Its pages date the family business to around 1700, say the Nakagawa produced Nara sarashi, a fine hemp cloth used for samurai formal wear, and describe the building as having been moved from the site of the fountain plaza in front of the station. That account of a relocated building does not match the 1915 construction date given by the Agency and the city. This site follows the Agency's database.

The Five Registered Structures of the Nakagawa Family Residence

All five were registered in the 79th round of registrations, as numbers 29-0215 to 29-0219, and all under the same criterion: contributing to the historic landscape of the nation. The Agency's database gives the following structures and dates.

• Main house: 2-storey timber, tiled roof, building area 143 m². 1915, renovated 2001
• Connecting corridor: single-storey timber, tiled roof, building area 30 m². 1915, renovated 2001
• Annex: single-storey timber, tiled roof, building area 24 m². Early Showa period, renovated 2001
• Storehouse: 2-storey earthen-walled storehouse, tiled roof, building area 84 m². 1915, renovated 2001
• Brick wall: brick, 20 m long. Around 1915

Only the annex is later, from the early Showa period. The other four buildings went through a renovation in 2001.

Layout of the Nakagawa Compound

Pieced together from the Agency's and the city's notes, the Nakagawa Family Residence is arranged like this. The main house faces east onto the lane, presenting a latticed shopfront to the street. Behind it lies a courtyard, with the annex on its far side. A corridor bends at a right angle to link the back of the main house with the annex. The storehouse stands in the western depths of the plot with its ridge running north to south, and the brick wall marks the southern boundary.

On the other side of that wall, the family once ran its weaving workshop. Home and business shared one block, divided by brick. Walking from front to back, the Nakagawa property moves from the public face of the townhouse, to the private rooms around the courtyard, to the storehouse and the line that once separated house from factory.

Nara City notes that from the lane in front of the main house you can look straight down across Omiya-dori to Renchoji Temple in Aburasaka. Each building's construction and details are covered on its own page.

Visiting the Nakagawa Family Residence

As Machiya Imazushi, the Nakagawa Family Residence hosts tea ceremony and ikebana sessions and ozashiki evenings with a Naramachi geiko, all private and by reservation only. No regular public opening was announced as of October 2026. According to the operator's English pages, groups are limited to 5 people, requests should be sent through the contact form at least one month ahead, and a quote is prepared to match the program. As a reference, a tea ceremony or ikebana session for 1 person is listed at 28,000 yen, interpretation included.

Without a booking, a visit means viewing the front of the main house from the lane. The corridor and annex around the courtyard, and the storehouse and brick wall at the back, are largely hidden from the street. There is no official guidance on photography, and as the compound is still in private hands, take care not to capture neighboring homes or passers-by when photographing from the street.

The operator gives the walk to the Nakagawa Family Residence as about 4 minutes from Exit 7-S of Kintetsu Nara Station and about 10 minutes from JR Nara Station. No parking is mentioned, so arriving by train is the practical choice.