Former Nakayama Family Residence

Former Nakayama Family Residence: A Business Magnate's Hilltop Estate in Kurashiki

The Former Nakayama Family Residence (旧中山家住宅, Kyū Nakayama-ke Jūtaku) is the hillside estate of the businessman Nakayama Setsutarō in Tsurajima-chō Nishinoura, Kurashiki City, Okayama Prefecture, begun around 1911 and completed with its garden in 1919. Five of its buildings, the main house, the detached house and inner storehouse, the middle storehouse, the rice storehouse and the nagayamon gate, were entered on the register of Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on November 2, 2018.

Locals have long called it Tsurajima Goten, the Tsurajima Palace. The estate sits on the southern foot of Mount Ōhira, on the east bank of the Takahashi River, where a slope was cut back and walled on three sides with stone ramparts about 11 meters high to create a level terrace of roughly 1,000 tsubo. According to the preservation society that now looks after the house, that plot was carved out of about 10,000 tsubo of land Setsutarō owned in the surrounding hills.

Seen from the streets below, the tiled roofs rising above the stone walls look more like a castle than a house. According to the family's own account, that was the point.

Nakayama Setsutarō and Why the House Was Built

Nakayama Setsutarō was born in 1873, the eldest son of Nakayama Saiichirō, a low-ranking samurai who served at the Nishinoura administrative outpost of the Yamazaki house of Nariwa. After studying at the Osaka Commercial School he worked in trading and mine management, and in 1910 he joined Kuhara Mining, the core company of the industrialist Kuhara Fusanosuke. A lucrative deal selling Japanese copper to Tsarist Russia made his name, and as senior managing director he sat on the boards of many companies in the Kuhara group.

Work on the Former Nakayama Family Residence ran in parallel with that rise. The preservation society records that Setsutarō built it for his mother, Kano, who wished to live in "a house like a castle." The same account suggests that a visit to Kuhara's vast mansion at Sumiyoshi in Kobe gave him a second motive: a residence that matched his new standing among Japan's business elite.

Craftsmen came from far afield. A master carpenter summoned from Kyoto directed local Tsurajima builders on the main house, Kyoto carpenters and plasterers built a tea room that no longer survives, and gardeners who served the Kuhara household in Tokyo laid out the grounds. The completion ceremony in 1919 doubled as the golden wedding anniversary of Setsutarō's parents and reportedly went on for two days.

The 11-Meter Stone Walls of the Former Nakayama Family Residence

The first thing visitors to the Former Nakayama Family Residence notice is not any of the five registered buildings but the retaining walls beneath them. The preservation society explains that the original stonework collapsed twice in heavy rain during the decade of construction. The owners then turned to Obayashi, the Osaka contractor, and the walls were rebuilt under an engineer who specialized in castle ramparts. Green pine logs were buried at the corners and stone posts six shaku (about 1.8 meters) long were set into the fabric, a technique said to follow the walls of Osaka Castle.

The face of the wall curves outward at the base and steepens toward the top in the profile known as mushagaeshi, designed on castles to stop attackers climbing. The stone came from Kitagi Island in the Seto Inland Sea, was landed at Tamashima port and hauled up by hand. Local tradition credits a crew led by Ōmoto Hyakumatsu, a native of nearby Tsurushinden who later founded the Omoto Gumi construction company, and the firm's own company history notes that it took on part of the work on Nakayama's residence.

How the Estate Is Laid Out

The entrance to the Former Nakayama Family Residence is the 27-meter Nagayamon on the east edge of the site. Beyond it the main house stands at the center of the terrace, facing south over a garden of ponds and a running stream. A covered corridor links the west side of the main house to the detached house and inner storehouse, and farther north, at the back of the estate, the middle storehouse and the rice storehouse stand side by side on tall stone plinths, their ridges running east to west.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs dates the main house, the detached house and inner storehouse, and both storehouses to around 1914, and the nagayamon gate to around 1915. Work on the walls and the garden continued after the buildings were up, and the whole estate was finished in 1919.

Water for the garden ponds was piped in iron from an intake and filtering pond on the hill to the north, below what is now the campus of Kurashiki University of Science and the Arts. It fills a pond in the rear garden, runs past the east side of the inner storehouse, passes beneath the covered corridor and spills into the front pond. The preservation society suggests Setsutarō may have copied the idea from Kuhara, who had used his mining experience in drainage to bring mountain water into his own house.

A natural route through the estate is to pass through the gate, approach the main house entrance, look out over the garden from the reception rooms, follow the corridor into the detached house and finish at the two storehouses at the rear. Each building has its own page with details of its construction.

Later Years at the Former Nakayama Family Residence

Setsutarō himself lived here for only about 15 years, after returning home in 1946 until his death in 1961 at the age of 88. Before then he kept homes in Hakodate, Osaka and Kobe, and his father and other relatives looked after the estate. His visits once or twice a year were remembered as something like a feudal lord's return to his domain.

After the Second World War, when Okayama Prefecture was working to build an industrial zone on its southern coast, the house was also used to entertain business leaders. One witness, Miyake Yūjirō, who frequented the house at the time, claimed that a lunch meeting held here during that campaign was where the Mizushima industrial complex was effectively decided. No record of what was discussed has been found, and the preservation society says so plainly.

After the 2018 registration, a preservation society formed by local architects and builders repaired the damaged buildings, finishing the work in March 2023. The house has opened to the public on weekends and national holidays since the spring of that year.

Visiting the Former Nakayama Family Residence: Hours, Admission and Access

The Former Nakayama Family Residence is open on Saturdays, Sundays and national holidays, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., and closes over the New Year period. Admission is 500 yen for adults (high school age and over) and free for junior high school students and younger children.

The house may close temporarily in summer. For 2026 the preservation society has announced a closure because of extreme heat, running July 18 through September 27, so check the official website before you go.

By public transport, take the Ryobi Bus Komizo Line from the stop in front of JR Kurashiki Station and get off at Dondon. The ride takes around 30 minutes, and the house is about a 3-minute walk from the stop, where you will see the high stone walls at the foot of the hill behind the houses. Drivers will find 3 parking areas near the estate with room for 45 cars in total, 20 of them set aside first for visitors with disabilities and older visitors.

Expect plenty of steps and uneven ground inside the estate; the doors of the rear storehouses are reached by flights of 10 or more stone steps, so comfortable shoes help. The official information does not state a photography policy, so ask at reception.