Myokyoji Guest Hall and Priests' Quarters

Saijo Inari's great guest hall

The Myokyoji Guest Hall and Priests' Quarters (妙教寺客殿及び庫裏, Myōkyō-ji Kyakuden oyobi Kuri) is a building of 1916 north-west of the main hall at Saijo Inari Myokyoji in Takamatsu Inari, Kita Ward, Okayama City, registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 2009/01/08. The temple calls it the Daikyakuden, the great guest hall. It joins two functions: reception rooms for visitors, and the kuri, the kitchen and living quarters of the priests.

The national database and the temple date it to 1916; the table in an Okayama City article gives the following year. It was renovated in 2006, when the earth-floored kitchen was restored; sacred water is now handed out there. The city article names the carpenters as Ozone Tsunajiro and Kawahara Sakichi, among others.

An exposed frame and a curving entrance

The Myokyoji Guest Hall and Priests' Quarters is an L-shaped composition. The guest hall runs east to west under a hip-and-gable roof, and the priests' quarters, under a plain gable, run north to south from its eastern end. All the roofs are covered in heavy tiles. The building area is 562 square metres, with a connecting corridor.

The most powerful elevation is the gable end of the priests' quarters, where posts, beams and carved frog-leg struts are left exposed so that you read the building's skeleton from the forecourt. To the west of it sits the main entrance under a karahafu, the undulating cusped gable reserved for formal arrivals.

The guest hall's four rooms are arranged in a square, two by two, with an alcove and other fittings for receiving guests. The Agency for Cultural Affairs praises its weighty, dignified bearing and registered it for its contribution to the historic landscape. A corridor runs north from the hall to the drum tower, closing off the garden behind.

What to look for, and visiting

The Myokyoji Guest Hall and Priests' Quarters is one of the few registered buildings here whose interior you can visit. Entry is combined with the Kanshotei garden, from 9:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.; admission is from 300 yen for adults, from 200 yen for students and groups, and free for primary-school children and younger. It closes on some event days.

Before going in, compare the exposed gable frame with the curving entrance beside it. Inside, the tatami rooms look onto the Kanshotei garden, a dramatic arrangement of rocks that borrows Mount Ryuo as its backdrop and which, according to the temple, was designated a Place of Scenic Beauty by Okayama Prefecture in 2026. Opening hours and directions are on the Saijo Inari Myokyoji page.