Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse

What the Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse is

The Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse (萱島酒造北蔵, Kayashima Shuzō Kitagura) is a single-storey timber storehouse built in 1906 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 220 m².

The Kayashima North Storehouse stands east of the brewing storehouse with its ridge at right angles to it. After the two buildings of 1894 it is the oldest on the site, older than the big expansion of the 1910s. The official description says it is known as the finished-goods store, specifically the bottling room.

A long, narrow plan

The North Storehouse is 4.5 ken wide and 13 ken deep. Taking 1 ken as about 1.8 meters, that is roughly 8.2 by 23.6 meters, nearly three times as deep as it is wide.

A long plan like this suits work that moves in one direction, such as bottling and storing finished product. The brewery's outline of its process ends with storage, blending, pasteurization and finally bottling and shipping, which places the Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse at the very end of the line.

A separate structure has been added against the east gable in recent decades. The official description notes the addition but judges the main body well preserved.

A proper ceiling inside

What sets the Kayashima North Storehouse apart is its interior finish. Unlike the other buildings, the official description says, it has a saobuchi ceiling and is carefully built.

A saobuchi ceiling is made of thin boards laid over slender battens set at regular intervals, the standard ceiling of a Japanese reception room. Brewery storehouses usually leave the roof framing exposed or keep the finish utilitarian, so a ceiling in a room for finished bottles stands out. Keeping dust off the product and buffering heat from the roof space would be plausible reasons, though the sources do not say.

It was registered for contributing to the historic landscape of the country: a late Meiji storehouse that also shows the extra care given to the room where the sake left the brewery.

Seeing the Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse

The Kayashima Sake Brewery North Storehouse is a working building at the back of the site, east of the brewing storehouse, and its interior is closed. The ceiling can only be seen from inside, so ask at SAKE GALLERY Tohzai or call the brewery (+81-978-72-1181) if you hope to see it.

From outside, look at how its ridge meets the brewing storehouse at a right angle. The North Storehouse was there eight years before the brewing storehouse of 1914, and the junction shows how the larger building was fitted to it.