Harinakano Nakano Acupuncture Main House

The house at the centre of the compound

Harinakano Nakano Acupuncture Main House is the principal dwelling of the Nakano family's acupuncture practice in Higashisumiyoshi Ward, Osaka, built in 1910 and entered on the national register as Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 5 December 2019.

It stands at the centre of the compound's northern edge, facing the street. A single storey of timber frame covering 159 square metres, it is the largest of the seven registered buildings. The roof is irimoya, hipped above and gabled at the ridge, laid with pantiles, and a geya aisle roof runs round all four sides. A lavatory block and a newer wing project from the eastern face.

The plastering is the telling detail. Shikkui is carried right up over the eaves soffit, sealing the timber from view, and a mushiko-mado, a barred window formed in the plaster itself, is cut into the upper wall. Vertical boards protect the lower wall. Sealing the eaves this way was an Osaka townhouse response to fire, and it gives the main house the same surface as the storehouses on the southern side.

Inside, the western half is an earth-floored working space and the eastern half holds the living rooms. The wing on the east was built around 1938 to hold patient rooms, and it is finished to a higher standard, with a raised timber floor throughout.

Why it was registered

The listing criterion is contribution to the historic landscape of the country, and the Agency for Cultural Affairs describes the building as the core of the compound.

Two things carry the case. The first is fabric. Plaster carried over the eaves, a barred plaster window, a boarded lower wall: this combination was standard specification in Osaka at the end of the Meiji period, and few examples survive in the outer wards in this condition.

The second is the patient wing. A livelihood is written into the plan. The Nakano house is recorded as having lodged patients who had travelled too far to return the same day, and the wing gives that account a physical form. Harinakano Nakano Acupuncture Main House is a dwelling and a piece of medical infrastructure at once.

What to look for

From the northern street the hipped-gable roof spreads wide, with the aisle eaves running below it. Two roof lines instead of one make the building sit lower and calmer than its frontage would suggest.

Find the mushiko-mado on the upper wall. It is a window with no frame of its own, its bars modelled in plaster, letting light through while keeping embers out. Bar thickness and spacing vary from house to house; here the bars are thick and set well apart.

Look east and the newer wing steps forward from the main block. Its ridge height and eaves projection are slightly out of step, so the addition is legible from the street. Osaka City's report lists the main house walls among the elements still awaiting attention, and the surface here is visibly less recently worked than the storehouses to the south.

Seeing it

Harinakano Nakano Acupuncture Main House is not open to visitors. It is the family home, and neither the compound nor the interior can be entered.

The exterior is seen from the northern street. The street is narrow and the frontage is wide, so the far side of the road is the place to stand for a complete view. There is no admission charge and no opening hours.

Keep photography to the exterior from the road. This is a private residence, so avoid shooting through windows or framing residents. Directions from the station and the viewing conditions for the compound as a whole are set out on the Harinakano Nakano Acupuncture page.