Shōwa
昭和Browse Japan’s cultural heritage from the Shōwa period (1926 – 1989). Filter by prefecture, type, and keyword, with concise stories, maps, and travel tips.
The museum annex of 1969 by Kikutake Kiyonori in Matsue lifts its storage above open galleries, exposed concrete below and white cement above, beside his museum.
The former Tadokoro school auditorium in Onan, Shimane, a timber hall of 1928 under a great hip-and-gable roof, tells of schooling in the old town of Mizuho.
Built in 1933 facing the family's main house on Izumo's Momen Kaido, this tall two-storey wing is pierced by a kakedashi passage running through to the canal.
A 19-metre reinforced concrete chimney built in 1957 at Shimomori Brewery in Tsuwano. It vented the kiln that steamed sake rice and now marks the brewery from afar.
The early-Showa rice mill at Shimomori Brewery in Tsuwano handled rice polishing, the first step of sake-making, and completes a quiet street front beside the storehouse.
The assembly hall of the Shimane prefectural government in Matsue, built with the main office in 1959, sets its chamber on the second floor behind horizontal eaves.
The main building of the Shimane prefectural government in Matsue, a modernist office of 1959 on the castle's third bailey, crosses columns with white eaves.
The Shimane Prefectural Civic Center of 1968 before the gate of Matsue Castle sets a concert hall amid low wings, its colonnade matching the government building.
The Shimane Prefectural Library of 1968 in Matsue, by Kikutake Kiyonori, sets L-shaped reading rooms round a steel-roofed lobby and looks out to the castle park.
The Shimane Prefectural Budokan of 1970 in Matsue, by Kikutake Kiyonori, closes itself off beside the open library and spans its dojo with 40-metre steel trusses.
The Sumikawa power station of 1943 on the Hikimi River in Masuda, Shimane, sets its generator hall and offices in echelon behind plain white walls of wartime.
The Hikimi power station of 1928 in Masuda, Shimane, a working hydro station of large concrete blocks, has a Western-style front of pilasters that recalls a chapel.
The Tsumori clinic in Matsue, Shimane, an early Showa timber building registered in 2007, has a steep half-hipped roof, a bay window and a neat Western design.
Tsuwano Catholic Church in Shimane, rebuilt in 1929 in single-spired Gothic style with a tatami floor, stands where Urakami Christians died. Registered in 1996.
Hoseikan Yusentei at Tamatsukuri Onsen in Matsue, Shimane, is a timber pavilion of 1931 built for imperial guests and registered as a Cultural Property in 2018.
A tiny early Showa well shed at the Yamashita estate in Gotsu, Shimane: four posts, a red-tiled gable, bamboo lath, a wooden well curb and a stone washing floor.
A 1929 two-story guest wing beside the main house in Gotsu, Shimane, with tatami reception rooms on both floors, a tokonoma, staggered shelves and a writing bay.
An early Showa garden gate and wall at the Yamashita estate in Gotsu, Shimane: a white wall 2.2 meters high and 25 meters long, and a bracketed gate 2.3 meters wide.
Completed in 1933 at Shirokanedai, Tokyo, the Former Residence of Prince Asaka was designated an Important Cultural Property in 2015. Lalique glass survives inside.
The Kiyosu Bridge of 1928 over the Sumida in Tokyo, a self-anchored chain suspension bridge of the post-earthquake rebuilding, was modelled on a bridge at Cologne.