Meiji

Built in 1871 as part of the Meiji government's Mint Bureau, this neoclassical stone portico features six Tuscan-order columns of Seiryūzan stone and a triangular pediment, designed by Irish-born British engineer Thomas James Waters. Designated as an Important Cultural Property alongside the adjacent Senpukan, it is one of Japan's oldest surviving Western-style buildings. Today it serves as the entrance to the Former Sakuranomiya Public Hall, a French restaurant and wedding venue in Osaka.

On Osaka's Okawa River stand the remains of Japan's first modern mint, founded in 1871. Senpukan, the old main gate, a guard house and early gas lamps survive here.

Discover the Former Main Hall of Abe Oji Shrine, a Registered Tangible Cultural Property built in 1908 along the historic Kumano Kaido in Osaka's Abeno Ward. Learn about its distinctive nagare-zukuri architecture and the shrine's deep ties to the Kumano pilgrimage and Abe no Seimei.

The kyakuma at Gantokuji in Kadoma, Osaka, is a Meiji-era reserve guest room. Though a secondary space, it was finished with choice timber and registered in 2006.

The taikoro at Gantokuji in Kadoma, Osaka, is a Meiji-era drum tower. A long range on a cut-stone plinth faces the street, and its tower carries cusped katomado windows.

Jigan-ji's bell tower in Yao, Osaka, built in 1900, is a Registered Tangible Cultural Property. This open frame on a cut-stone base hangs its bronze bell from the gable.

Jigan-ji's side gate and earthen wall in Yao, Osaka, date to early Meiji. A one-bay gate and a 12-metre tiled wall run north to the main gate, edging a temple town.

Built in 1874, this is the oldest registered building at Chihaya Shrine, Osaka, and served as its main hall until 1928. Chrysanthemum and wave carvings.

Built in late Meiji, the Fujii rice store carries a mokko crest motif on its sliding earthen door and round windows cut through both gable walls, at the plot's rear.

The barn of the Mezan Atsushi Residence, the oldest of its eight registered structures, built in 1905, its plastered walls and bracketed eaves facing the entrance path.

The storehouse of the Yoshida brewery in Ikeda, Osaka, maker of Midori-ichi sake: a three-story plaster kura of about 1878, crowned by a Shōki roof figure.

The main building of Yoshida Sake Brewery, from about 1878, is a grand merchant townhouse in the old Osaka sake town of Ikeda, with black plaster and fire walls.

A registered cultural property in Ikeda, Osaka: an 8.8-meter black-plastered wall from around 1878, fronting a sake brewery founded in 1697 on the old Nose Kaidō.

Discover Locomotive No. 233 in Kyoto: Japan's oldest surviving domestically mass-produced steam locomotive, built in 1903–1904 and designated an Important Cultural Property in 2016. A milestone of Meiji-era industrial heritage at Kyoto Railway Museum.

The National Treasure celadon vase 'Bansei', fired at Southern Song China's Longquan kilns, passed from an empress to a Kyoto temple before reaching Izumi, Osaka.

Osaka's Kyou Shooku library holds eleven Song-printed volumes of the Shiji jijie, the oldest Shiji commentary, a National Treasure once owned by Naito Konan.

Printed in Southern Song China in 1139, these 17 National Treasure volumes of the Maoshi zhengyi rest at Kyo-U Library in Osaka with Kanazawa Bunko seals.

The Tobiseiji Hanaike at the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka, is a National Treasure regarded as the finest surviving example of Chinese Yuan-dynasty Longquan celadon with iron-spot decoration. Standing 27.3 cm tall in the elegant yuhuchun form, twenty-one iron spots dance across its jade-green glaze. Discover this masterpiece treasured in Japan for centuries through the Konoike merchants and the famed Ataka Collection.

A herdboy rides his ox home through falling snow in Li Di's Returning Herd in Snow, a Southern Song National Treasure kept at Nara's Yamato Bunkakan museum.

Discover the Kajiwara Family Residence Storehouse, a nationally Registered Tangible Cultural Property built around 1907 in the historic castle town of Hiji, Oita Prefecture. Explore its Meiji-era dozo architecture, the merchant heritage of Beppu Bay, and nearby attractions.