Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse

What the Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse is

The Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse (萱島酒造門口倉庫, Kayashima Shuzō Monguchi Sōko) is a single-storey timber building from 1916 that serves as both gateway and storeroom at Kayashima Sake Brewery in Tsunai, Kunisaki City, Oita Prefecture, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on January 16, 1998. It has a tiled roof and a building area of 50 m².

The Kayashima Gate Storehouse is attached to the earthen-walled rice storehouse built the same year. Under one roof it combines a passage into the grounds and a small store.

Gateway and storeroom in one

According to the official description, the 1.5 ken of the Gate Storehouse nearest the rice storehouse form the gateway. Taking 1 ken as about 1.8 meters, that is a passage about 2.7 meters wide. The original gate doors have since been replaced by a roller shutter.

The rest is storage, 3 by 2 ken, or roughly 5.5 by 3.6 meters. The walls are Shinkabe, with the posts left exposed, and the lower wall is lined with Koshiita wainscot boards that take the scuffs of people, loads and rain splash. It is a plain, practical building.

The rice storehouse and the Gate Storehouse both date from 1916: the store for raw rice and the entrance beside it were laid out together.

Why the Gate Storehouse was registered

The Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse was registered for contributing to the historic landscape of the country. The official description presents it as an ancillary building in a brewery that forms a single whole with the family residence.

On its own it is small and modest. But Kayashima Sake Brewery puts the family's main house at the center of the plot, with home and works on one site, and within that arrangement the Gate Storehouse handles the way in and a share of the storage.

Seeing the Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse

Attached to the rice storehouse on the prefectural road, the Kayashima Sake Brewery Gate Storehouse appears to be easy to see from the street side along with it. The interior is not open. The gateway seems to remain in use, so do not stand or park in front of it.

Look at the rhythm of the exposed posts, the height of the wainscot, and the junction with the rice storehouse, where white plastered earth wall meets timber post-and-panel wall and the difference between the two buildings is plain. For photography or access to the grounds, ask at SAKE GALLERY Tohzai or call the brewery (+81-978-72-1181).