Meiji
明治Browse Japan’s cultural heritage from the Meiji period (1868 – 1912). Filter by prefecture, type, and keyword, with concise stories, maps, and travel tips.
Built in 1905 on the site of Edo era dormitories, this timber schoolhouse in Bizen, Okayama sits inside the grounds of Japan's oldest school for commoners.
Jissaiji's gate in Kurashiki is a tiled yakuimon of 1884, its 2.6-metre opening flanked by earthen sleeve walls and carried on flattened posts. Registered 2019.
Jissaiji Bell Tower in Kurashiki was built in 1879 and moved from the cemetery in 1926. It reuses older timbers and drops one tie beam to clear the striking log.
Jissaiji Outer Wall and Stone Wall in Kurashiki encloses the temple's east and north sides: a 61-metre Meiji earthen wall set on 71 metres of old stonework.
Jissaiji Barn in Kurashiki, from about 1884, stands by the temple gate with a hipped south end and a gabled north end, and it served as a flood shelter in 1893.
A late Meiji house in Tsuyama, Okayama, registered in 2009 as a model of architectural form. Thick, naturally curved logs cross in a grid over its earthen doma.
A late Meiji clay storehouse in Tsuyama, Okayama, registered in 2009. First used for rice, it has a separately set gable roof, plaster walls and board skirting.
A long late Meiji barn in Tsuyama, Okayama, listed in 2009. Its south half held a store and room above; the north half stabled horses and cattle under a hay loft.
A late Meiji gate and well shelter fronting the old Izumo road in Tsuyama, Okayama, registered in 2009. Inside is an octagonal tuff well inscribed April 1907.
The early Meiji service wing of the Kajimura estate in Tsuyama, Okayama: 25 square meters of privies and utility space, registered as a building hard to reproduce.
The main house of a merchant compound in Mabicho, Kurashiki. Two storeys, a shikidai entrance and a six-room plan with carved seasonal transoms. Listed in 2025.
A plastered storehouse of 51 m² on the eastern edge of a merchant compound in Mabicho, Kurashiki. It held working tools and contains a matted room. Listed in 2025.
A gate 1.3 m wide and 8.5 m of tiled wall inside a merchant compound in Mabicho, Kurashiki. Bending at right angles, they close the western side. Listed in 2025.
A small thatched teahouse of 22 m² in a merchant compound in Mabicho, Kurashiki. Its west corridor projects out past the boundary wall. Listed in 2025.
A storehouse of 69 m² joined to its neighbour at the eastern edge of a merchant compound in Mabicho, Kurashiki, with lattice plaster on its west face. Listed 2025.
Originally built in 1910 as the Soja Police Station, this is the only surviving example of Meiji-era Western-style architecture in Soja City, Okayama. Notable for its octagonal tower entrance and clapboard exterior, it was registered as a National Tangible Cultural Property in 2006. Today the building serves as a local museum showcasing roughly 1,600 items related to traditional Bicchu industries such as patent medicines, Aso cast metalwork, and rush-grass tatami products.
Built around 1885 on the old Inaba Kaido post road in Mimasaka, this brewer's house pairs a shop room with nine rooms and a formal entrance. Registered in 2017.
Dated to 1885, this single-storey sake hall in Mimasaka, Okayama, stands wall to wall with the brewing storehouse, with a rice-steaming room built on its west side.
An earthen storehouse of around 1885 at the south edge of a working sake brewery in Mimasaka, Okayama, white plaster above a tile band, with boarded lower walls.
A mid-Meiji storehouse at Tsuji Honten in Katsuyama, with dragon-and-tiger plaster relief inside its shutters. The only one of nine registered as hard to reproduce.