Shoji Family Residence Storehouse

A Meiji Tool Store at the North-East Corner

The Shoji Family Residence Storehouse (荘司家住宅土蔵, Shōji-ke Jūtaku Dozō) is a mid Meiji-period storehouse for tools in Nishiando, Ando Town, Ikoma District, Nara Prefecture, and was listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2020.

This 2-storey store stands at the north-east corner of the Shoji property and covers 37 square metres. It was extended around 1935 (Showa 10). Its south side meets the corridor serving the detached and new reception rooms, so it can be reached from the guest wing.

Where the inner storehouse behind the main house dates from the Edo period, the Shoji Family Residence Storehouse is a second tool store added in the Meiji era. As the family built more reception rooms, it also expanded its storage.

Why It Was Registered

The Shoji Family Residence Storehouse received registration number 29-0299 in the 95th round of national registrations, dated 2020/4/3, for contributing to the historic landscape of the country.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs notes that together with the inner storehouse it forms the northern edge of the compound, a line of white plastered stores that gives the back of the property a tidy frontage. For a building meant to hold tools, it also shows a surprising amount of care on the outside, with a roof that changes shape from end to end and wall bases finished differently face by face.

What to Look For

Hip-and-gable at one end, plain gable at the other

The roof of the Shoji Family Residence Storehouse is covered in sangawara-buki pan tiles. Its east end is irimoya-zukuri, a hip-and-gable form, while the west end is a plain kirizuma-zukuri gable. A single roof with two different ends is unusual, and the building looks quite different depending on which side you see it from. No source we found explains the choice.

Namako tiles on the west face

The walls are finished in shikkui lime plaster. Around the base, the west face alone is clad in namako-kabe, flat tiles set with raised plaster joints that form a bold white lattice, while the other faces have tateita-bari vertical boarding.

Board floors and a traditional roof frame

Inside, the floors are boarded and the walls plastered. The roof is carried on a wagoya frame, the Japanese system of short posts standing on cross-beams. It is a plain, sturdy interior made for moving things in and out.

A store behind the guest rooms

Because its south side joins the reception room corridor, storage sits immediately behind the rooms where guests were received. The store may have held furnishings and utensils for entertaining as well as tools, but no record of its contents survives in published sources.

Visiting

The Dozō is part of a private home and is not open; as of October 2026 we found no announcement of open days. Standing at the north-east corner of the plot, its outer faces may be visible from outside the property, though we have not confirmed this on site. Please stay off the grounds and respect the residents' privacy.

Photographs supplied by the Ando Town Board of Education in the Agency for Cultural Affairs database show the exterior.