Tanaka Family Residence Entrance and Zashiki Wing

The Tanaka Family Residence Entrance and Zashiki Wing

The Tanaka Family Residence Entrance and Zashiki Wing (田中家住宅玄関及び座敷棟, Tanaka-ke Jūtaku Genkan oyobi Zashikitō) is a formal entrance and reception wing built in 1855 on the Tanaka estate in Sukematsucho, Izumiotsu City, Osaka Prefecture, and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on December 5, 2007. Joined to the north side of the main house, it was where the family, as keepers of a honjin, received its most important guests.

The wing measures 5 and a half by 3 bays, 90 square metres in area, under a hip-and-gable roof of hongawara tiles. Where it meets the main house, a shikidai entrance, the raised step for formal arrivals, faces east beneath its own gable-fronted roof.

A Model of Its Type

Of the six registered Tanaka buildings, only the Entrance and Zashiki Wing was registered as a model of its type. The database does not spell out the reasons, but the wing keeps an entire sequence of formal reception rooms, from raised entrance to inner room, in a single building.

The zashiki, or formal rooms, are a 10-mat room and an 8-mat room set at right angles to each other. The 10-mat room has an oshiita, an early form of display alcove, at the east end of its north wall; the 8-mat room has a full tokonoma, shelves and a built-in writing bay. Decoration grows more complete the further in you go, which may reflect a house that seated guests according to rank.

The Garden Side

Photographs on the Osaka Bunkazai Navi site show the second room opening onto the garden, and the wing is clearly seen from the garden in turn. The garden is attributed to Fujibayashi Sogen, a tea master of the Sekishu school, and the rooms sit where they look out over it.

The right-angle plan gives each room a different view of the garden. It is also worth noticing that the old-fashioned oshiita and the fully developed alcove sit side by side in one wing.

Access

The Entrance and Zashiki Wing stands north of the main house, inside the estate. The Tanaka Family Residence is a private home and is not open to the public, so the entrance and the formal rooms cannot be visited.