Konkokyo Research Institute Western-Style Building

A towered Western-style building for 1930 guests

The Konkokyo Research Institute Western-Style Building (金光教教学研究所洋館, Konkōkyō Kyōgaku Kenkyūsho Yōkan) is a two-storey timber building in Western style erected in 1930 on a hill in Otani, Konkō-chō, Asakuchi City, Okayama Prefecture, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 2 November 2018.

The building stands on the grounds of the Konkokyo Research Institute, the research body of the Konkōkyō faith, and is linked by covered corridors to a Japanese-style guest hall and its entrance annex, both built in the same year as part of one facility for receiving visitors.

Why it was registered

It was registered as a building that contributes to the historic landscape. The Agency for Cultural Affairs points to the way it faces the guest hall across the forecourt, together forming a dignified front in which Japanese and Western buildings stand side by side.

Adding a Western-style reception wing to a Japanese residence or guest facility was a familiar move in modern Japan, a way of being ready for any kind of visitor. Here the Japanese guest hall holds the centre of the site, and the Konkokyo Research Institute Western-Style Building stands forward of it on the south side, so the value lies in the ensemble rather than in the building alone.

What to look for

The building faces west from the south side of the forecourt. It rises two storeys under a slate-covered Yosemune-zukuri hipped roof, with a small tower at the south-west corner and an entrance porch on the front. Among its low, copper-roofed Japanese neighbours, that towered outline is the one you notice first.

The walls are finished in washed artificial stone, a plasterer's technique in which cement mixed with crushed stone is applied and then rinsed to expose the aggregate, making a timber structure read as masonry. Semicircular windows and round medallion ornaments punctuate the facade at key points.

Inside, reception rooms line the ground floor and a large hall fills the upper floor. The building area is 208 square metres, and a covered corridor from the annex to the north connects the Konkokyo Research Institute Western-Style Building to the guest hall.

Visiting

The building is not open to the public. Okayama Prefecture lists it as closed, and the grounds and interiors cannot be entered. The research institute still uses the site, so anyone hoping to visit should contact Konkōkyō in advance.

No published guidance on photography was found.

Photographs showing the tower and entrance porch are posted on the Agency for Cultural Affairs database and on Asakuchi City's website.