Edo

The Main Hall of Daianji Temple in Sakai City, Osaka, is an Important Cultural Property believed to incorporate timbers from the lavish residence of Naya Sukezaemon, a legendary Momoyama-era merchant. Rebuilt in 1683 in the shoin-zukuri style with all-cypress construction, the hall preserves 76 magnificent Kano school partition paintings on gold leaf, offering a rare glimpse into Sakai's golden age of international trade.

The Kuzunoha Inari Shrine Main Hall, nestled within Abe Oji Shrine in Osaka's Abeno Ward, is a National Registered Tangible Cultural Property originally built as the Main Hall of Otokoyama Hachiman Shrine in Osaka's historic Semba merchant district. Relocated in 1907 and surviving the wartime destruction that obliterated Semba, this exquisite Edo-period structure — painted in vivid vermillion with polychrome accents — is the sole remaining shrine hall from one of Japan's most important commercial centers. Discover its rich architectural heritage and the legendary connection to Kuzunoha, the mystical fox mother of the famed onmyōji Abe no Seimei.

The nagayamon at the entrance to Kobayashi Ichizo's Ikeda villa is a late-Edo long-house gate, said to have been relocated here in 1936 from a village headman's estate.

The genkan at Gantokuji in Kadoma, Osaka, dates from about 1752, the oldest of the temple's four registered buildings. Its karahafu gable marks a formal entrance.

The shoin at Gantokuji in Kadoma, Osaka, is a late-Edo hall and the largest of the temple's four registered buildings. It looks two-storeyed but has a single lofty floor.

Main building of the Kotanijō museum: a late-Edo home of the Kotani, village headmen. A copper-clad gabled wing meets a tiled reception hall and a stepped entrance.

At the east end of the front row, this late-Edo storehouse, once a rice store and now the exhibition room, is the only one of the five registered as a model of design.

The oldest of the museum's five buildings, this mid-Edo gate is said to have come from the Hakata domain around 1871. Its front has board doors and comb-shaped windows.

A 103-meter Edo-period earthen wall on the east bank of the Amano River at Kongō-ji in Kawachinagano, Osaka. Plastered over a stone footing and capped with pantiles, it marks the boundary of a vanished sub-temple quarter.

Jigan-ji's drum tower in Yao, Osaka, dates to the late Edo period. Its offset upper storey with cusped windows rises above the earthen wall beside the main gate.

Jigan-ji's ablution pavilion in Yao, Osaka, covers barely 12 square metres. Carved details date it to the 1660s, the oldest of the temple's five registered buildings.

Jigan-ji's main hall in Yao, Osaka, rebuilt in 1817, is a Registered Tangible Cultural Property. This Shinshu hall is 19 metres wide and centres a temple town from 1606.

The Honbo Karamon at Shitennoji Temple in Osaka is an elegant Edo-period Chinese-style gate originally built as the formal entrance to the Gochikoin Hall, where memorial tablets of successive Tokugawa shoguns were enshrined. Featuring Zen-style architecture, exquisite dragon carvings, and Tokugawa hollyhock crest openwork, this gate was registered as a Tangible Cultural Property of Japan in 2022. Discover the artistry and history of this rare survivor of the 1945 Osaka Air Raids.

The Sanmon gate of Shinko-ji Temple in Shimoderamachi, Tennoji Ward, Osaka, is a single-bay yakui-mon gate built during the mid-Edo period (1661–1750) and registered as a Nationally Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2008. With its refined gable roof of traditional tiles and outstanding decorative carvings on the beams and rainbow ties, it stands as a precious testament to Edo-era craftsmanship in one of Osaka's most historic temple districts.

At the northwest corner of the Fujii estate in Higashiosaka stands a late-Edo tool storehouse, 5.9 metres of earthen wall under formal round-and-flat tile.

The Fujii main gate in Higashiosaka pairs keyaki doors with an attendants' waiting room, joining the Inui-gura storehouse to form one composed street elevation.

Sixty-one metres of tile-capped earthen wall run the eastern edge of the Fujii estate to meet the main gate, pierced only by one modest bracketed side gate.

Facing the Koya Kaido at the former Mikkaichi post town, this wide-fronted machiya belonged to the Yagi family, cotton wholesalers turned sake brewers.

This two-storey storehouse turns its gable to the old Koya Kaido: white lime plaster above, charred cedar below, a copper door at each window. Registered 2008.

In the satoyama hills of Nose, the northernmost town in Osaka, this thatched village hall enshrines the Medicine Buddha. Traced to 1555 and registered in 2004.