Wada Family Residence Outer Storehouse

The Big Storehouse in the North Corner

The Wada Family Residence Outer Storehouse (和田家住宅外蔵, Wada-ke Jūtaku Sotogura) is a two-storey Dozo-zukuri storehouse built in 1930 in the north corner of the Wada family estate in Miyamotocho, Kishiwada City, Osaka Prefecture, and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 21 August 2002. It stands apart from the other buildings and was used to store furniture and fittings.

The entrance is on the long side (Hirairi), under a Kirizuma-zukuri gabled roof of Hongawarabuki tiles. The walls were left in a rough base coat, with vertical boards over the lower part of the back and both sides. Its building area is 115 square metres, roughly five times that of the inner storehouse on the same estate.

Why It Was Registered

The Wada Family Residence Outer Storehouse was registered as a model of its type. The Agency for Cultural Affairs notes its three doorways facing the main house, each sheltered by a small canopy, and a plan divided into three rooms on the ground floor and one on the upper floor.

Three doors and three ground-floor rooms suggest that goods were sorted by kind and handled separately. A storehouse for fittings points to a household large enough to swap sliding doors and screens with the seasons and for special occasions, so the building tells you something about the scale of life in the house.

What to Look For

Compare the walls with the inner storehouse. That one is finished in white plaster; this one keeps its rough clay coat, the finish of a working store rather than a building meant to be seen. The two storehouses announce their different roles through their surfaces.

Along the front facing the main house, three doorways stand in a row, each with its own little canopy so that rain would not drive in whenever a door was opened.

Three rooms below and one open room above hint at a routine: sort and fetch on the ground floor, keep bulky items upstairs.

Visiting the Outer Storehouse

The Wada Family Residence Outer Storehouse stands in the north corner of the estate, inside the walls, and is not open to the public. From the south side, where the estate faces the street, it is hidden behind the main house.

From outside you can see only the perimeter, such as the nagayamon and the outer wall. Directions and visiting etiquette for the estate are on the Wada Family Residence page.