Kobatake Family Residence Rice Storehouse

The big single-storey store on the corner

The Kobatake Family Residence Rice Storehouse (古畑家住宅米蔵, Kobatake-ke Jūtaku Komegura) is a single-storey Dozo-zukuri storehouse on a farmstead in Nakahata, Takatsuki, Osaka Prefecture, built in the early Showa era and entered on the national register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 8 July 2008. It measures 10 metres by 4.9 metres, with a building area of 49 square metres.

It occupies the southeast corner of the property. Of the five storehouses on the farmstead it is the only one without an upper floor, and its footprint is roughly twice to more than three times that of the others. The Agency for Cultural Affairs calls it a large storehouse standing on the corner of an extensive compound.

The dating needs a word of explanation. The Agency's database gives the period as early Showa, but its Western-calendar field holds the span of the entire Showa era, 1926-1988. This article follows the period field. Either way, the Rice Storehouse is the newest of the eight registered buildings.

Why it was registered

The Kobatake Family Residence Rice Storehouse was registered, as number 27-0491, for its contribution to the historic landscape.

Position and size carry the case. A 10-metre run of white wall holds the corner of the plot and announces the scale of the household to anyone passing. It was the last building to go up on the site, yet it keeps the finish established by the Edo-period storehouses on the road: white lime plaster over a skirt of vertical boarding.

What to look for

The roof is a Kirizuma-zukuri gable in Sangawara-buki pantiles, and the walls are white Shikkui lime plaster above a boarded skirt. Because the building is low and long, the white wall and the dark band of boarding read as strong horizontals.

The door of the Kobatake Family Residence Rice Storehouse is in the north wall, toward the west end, facing the main house. The same wall has a small window sheltered by its own little eave. The storehouse opens inward, toward the life of the household, and turns a closed wall to the outside.

Inside, the building is divided into two rooms, and the walls are left as bare clay. That sets it apart from the West Storehouse, whose interior is lined with boards.

Visiting

The Kobatake Family Residence Rice Storehouse stands within the grounds of a private home. The interior is not open and the grounds cannot be entered.

Although it sits on the southeast corner of the plot, we have not been able to confirm how much of it can be seen from public ground. Its door and window face into the compound, so any view from outside would be of a closed wall. If you are in Nakahata, look at it together with the Nagayamon Gate and the east storehouses on the road, and keep to the exterior as seen from the public lane.