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 Tanuma Residence outer wall in Ashikaga runs 84 meters along the old Reiheishi road, an exposed-post timber wall of 1935 joined to the front gate. Registered 2006.
Completed in 1928 on the Arasawa above Nikko, Tanzeyama Sabo Dam runs 40 metres across the gorge, its andesite face laid in diagonal courses. Registered in 2003.
A 1934 timber gate east of the Teraoka Itoten shop in Sano, Tochigi, used for bringing in goods: 3.6 m tall, 3.1 m wide, with board fences on granite. Listed 2019.
The 1933 two-storey main house of the thread wholesaler Teraoka Itoten in Sano, Tochigi, with eaves on both floors, a gabled porch, and shoin and sukiya interiors.
A 1933 timber shop of the thread wholesaler Teraoka Itoten in Sano, Tochigi, with a hipped pantiled roof, plaster walls and a double-height front shop. Listed 2019.
The Nikko Kanaya Hotel Annex of 1935, by Kume Gonkuro, wears a Japanese face with a karahafu carriage porch and many-gabled roof over his own seismic timber frame.
The Sano Church in Tochigi, a timber church of 1934, pairs a Gothic-style front of rose window and pointed arches with Japanese bearing blocks on the columns inside.
The Hoto Upstream Sabo Dam in Nikko, Tochigi, a stone-faced gravity dam of 1952, holds back debris from Mount Nantai and enriches the view from the Irohazaka.
Ashikaga's 1930 waterworks office, timber-built with French tiles and dormers, overlooks the Watarase River. A guest room was added in 1934 for an imperial visit.
Built in 1930 at Ashikaga's Midoricho plant, this small concrete chamber received water pumped uphill and passed it to the reservoir, where gravity took over.
Completed in 1930, this concrete tank of about 60 by 27 metres lies buried under turf on an Ashikaga hilltop and still feeds the city below by gravity alone.
Moka City Kubo Auditorium, a 1938 timber school hall by Endo Arata, pupil of Frank Lloyd Wright. Twin towers, a low balcony, Tochigi's first registered building.
The Yamagata Aritomo Memorial Hall Annex is a refined two-story wooden Western-style house built around 1927 within the historic grounds of Yamagata Farm in Yaita City, Tochigi Prefecture. Registered as a National Tangible Cultural Property in 2021, it features a hipped tile roof, a south-facing dormer window, and a pergola-shaded porch. Together with the adjacent main hall, it preserves the atmosphere of an early twentieth-century aristocratic country estate at the foot of Mount Takahara.
Small timber parcel store of 1935 at Ashio Station on the Watarase Keikoku Railway in Nikko, Tochigi, where goods sent by train awaited collection by owners.
Nara Christ Church, an Anglican church of 1930 beside Kofukuji, was built by Oki Kichitaro in a fully Japanese style with a tiled roof and coffered ceilings.
The Akahadayama Motogama Medium Kiln, a 1951 brick climbing kiln beside the large kiln in Nara, has 5 chambers in 9.7 m and reuses old bricks in the Edo method.
This 1930 timber building near JR Sakurai Station in Nara holds a kindergarten below and the chapel of Sakurai Saint Paul's Church above, with pointed-arch windows.
A 1967 house in Nara City under stacked hip-and-gable roofs, its central-corridor plan mixing sukiya woven-wood ceilings with new 1960s materials; registered 2018.
An early Showa storehouse in a Nara City garden corner, its front dressed in namako tiling, stepped kakegonuri doors and a plaster relief above; registered 2018.
An early Showa annex behind a Nara City house: two tatami rooms with tokonoma, writing bay, carved transom and cusped window, copper eaves; registered 2018.