Takahashi Sake Brewery

About Takahashi Sake Brewery

Takahashi Sake Brewery is a sake brewery whose red-brick new brewery and chimney, built around 1922 on the Suyoshi River at Jizo, Nagaoka City, Niigata Prefecture, were registered together as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties (structures) on November 29, 2006 (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Its leading brand is Choryo (Echigo Meimon Shukai).

The registration numbers are 15-0235 for the new brewery and 15-0236 for the chimney, both owned by Takahashi Shuzo Co., Ltd. (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

Building the Red-Brick Brewery

According to Nagaoka City's official web magazine, the business was founded in the Ansei era (1854 to 1860) by its first head as a dyer. The third head began the hexagonal chimney and the red-brick brewery, which took about three years and were completed in 1922.

Echigo Meimon Shukai notes that the brewery and chimney survived the wartime bombing of Nagaoka, the Niigata Earthquake and the Chuetsu Earthquake, and are loved as symbols of the Choryo brand and of the district.

The Two Registered Structures

Both were registered on November 29, 2006, as structures contributing to the historic landscape of the country (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

The new brewery is a three-storey building of timber-framed brick with a tiled roof and a building area of 1,278 square metres; its main block is 30 metres by 18 metres. A boiler house with a raised ventilating roof is attached on the east, and lean-to roofs run around it, making a large and complex building (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

The chimney stands on its own near the southeast corner of the main block: a hexagonal brick stack 1.2 metres to a side and about 20 metres high, with a decorative ring near the top (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

Visiting

Takahashi Sake Brewery is a working brewery, and no official information on tours has been published. The buildings can be seen from the surrounding streets; please do not disturb the brewery or neighbours.

The address is 1-8-2 Jizo, Nagaoka City. Each structure is described in its own article.