Sosendo Confectionery Shop

A Sweet Shop Running Through a Murakami Block

Sosendo Confectionery Shop (早撰堂菓子店, Sōsendō Kashiten) is a working Japanese sweet shop in Omachi, Murakami City, Niigata Prefecture, whose shop-house of 1893, west storehouse of 1887 and Taisho-era east storehouse were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Property structures on 26 December 2005.

It is a merchant's townhouse on what was the main street of the castle town of Murakami, and the main house faces east onto that street. The plot runs deep behind it. The west storehouse stands in the southwest corner, west of the main house, and the east storehouse stands northeast of that, showing its gable to Teramachi-dori, the street along the back of the plot. Shop, home and stores line up from the front street to the rear one.

The master carpenter of both the main house and the west storehouse is recorded as Masuda Torakichi. According to the Murakami City Tourist Association, the business has been making sweets since the Edo period, and in 2004 the main house became the first project of a townhouse revival effort, its front restored to a Taisho-era look.

Three Buildings on Two Streets

The Agency for Cultural Affairs counts the main house as one of the elements of the street's historic landscape, and singles out the east storehouse as a good example of how a merchant's premises were arranged, shaping the historic face of Teramachi-dori. All three were registered under the criterion of contributing to the historic landscape of the country. What makes the property distinctive is that it presents a building to each of two streets.

Opening Hours and Access

Sosendo Confectionery Shop is still in business. The Murakami City Tourist Association lists opening hours of 8:30 a.m. to about 6:00 p.m., closed on Sundays except during events. Wooden sweet moulds are displayed inside, and as a customer you can step into the shop room of the main house. No opening of the storehouses is announced.

During the town's doll and folding-screen festivals, when Murakami's townhouses open their rooms to visitors, displays are also set out at Sosendo.

Murakami Station on the JR Uetsu Line is about 20 minutes away on foot. By car it is about 5 minutes from the Murakami-Senami-Onsen interchange on the Nihonkai-Tohoku Expressway.