Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall

A Gate Between Hall and Garden

The Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall (北方文化博物館銅門及び塀, Dōmon oyobi Hei) in Somi, Konan Ward, Niigata City, is a timber gate with a connecting wall, built in 1889 and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 28 April 2000.

The Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall consists of a wall running from the estate's southeastern boundary wall to the bathhouse, and a gate set into it near the bathhouse. The gate is 2.1 metres wide and the wall 20 metres long. The Agency for Cultural Affairs says it neatly divides the forecourt of the great hall from the garden.

1889 was the year the fifth head's building campaign was completed; the great hall and the bathhouse also date from that year.

A Carefully Made Ancillary Structure

The Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall was registered as a model of good design. The gate is a one-bay Munamon with supporting posts on the garden side, and its copper roof, laid with standing battens, curves gently.

The agency calls both gate and wall carefully crafted ancillary structures. Small as it is, the gate marks the switch from the formal front of the great hall, where guests were received, to the stroll garden.

A Curving Copper Roof

Look first at the roof of the Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall. In batten-seam copper roofing, raised battens cover the joints between the sheets, so evenly spaced lines run down the roof. Because the roof curves, those lines curve with it.

Walk round to the garden side to see the supporting posts. The gate presents a different face toward the forecourt than it does toward the garden.

The wall ties the estate's outer boundary to the bathhouse, closing off the southeast corner by the great hall.

Visiting the Copper Gate and Wall

The Northern Culture Museum Copper Gate and Wall stands inside the Northern Culture Museum grounds, near the bathhouse southeast of the great hall. It stands where the hall meets the garden, so look for it around there.

The museum notes that the great hall's formal zelkova entrance is opened only for New Year, weddings, funerals and similar occasions. Ask at reception before taking photographs in the grounds.