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.
A four-and-a-half-mat tea house of 1927 in Toyama, built under a Yabunouchi tea master, moved away in 1941 and returned in 1981; registered as heritage in 1998.
The Former Otani Family Residence Front Gate in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1961 yakuimon gate 3.1 m wide with cloud-shaped brackets and a pierced-carving transom.
The Former Otani Family Residence Work Barn in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1944 barn with an earth-floored work area open to the roof, a tool loft and clapboard walls.
The Former Otani Family Residence Main House in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1935 Azumadachi farmhouse with a latticed gable, three rows of rooms and museum exhibits inside.
The Former Otani Family Residence Barn in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1943 two-story outbuilding facing the main house, with plaster and clapboard walls and a memorial room.
The Former Otani Family Residence Ash Hut in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1935 hut of 1.4 m² with earth-plastered walls and floor, built to store ash from the bathhouse.
The Former Otani Family Residence Bathhouse in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 1935 detached bath of 9.8 m² with a firebox open on three sides and a dog kennel on its side.
The Former Otani Family Residence Wall in Oyabe, Toyama, is a 153 m tiled timber wall of 1961, its south side set on boulders with a pierced-board transom.
The Komaki Dam on the Shogawa River in Toyama, a concrete gravity dam of 1930 designed against earthquakes, was once called the greatest dam in the East.
A 1935 riveted steel arch over the Matsu River in central Toyama, registered in 1999, the first bridge in the prefecture to be registered, still crossed by trams.
The Sasazu Bridge in Toyama, a Melan-type concrete arch of 1941 where the Hida road crosses the Jinzu River, spans 65 metres, the third-largest span before the war.
The Saburomaru Distillery in Tonami, Toyama, a converted timber factory moved here around 1954, is the oldest whisky distillery in Hokuriku, in use since 1952.
The Shakusenji Cylindrical Diversion Tank in Kamiichi, Toyama, is a concrete cylinder of 1954 that splits river water between two banks at 0.51 to 0.49.
The Shogawa Goguchi Weir in Tonami, Toyama, is a concrete weir of 1939 with ten radial gates that joined the river's scattered intakes for irrigation and power.
Built in 1928 for the Johana silk producers' association in Nanto, Toyama, this timber building wears a scratch-tile front that only looks like brick. Open today.
Smallest of four registered buildings at Shofuro in Nanto, Toyama, this prewar Showa storehouse hangs iron doors in a torii-shaped frame of black lime plaster.
At the north-west corner of the Shofuro site in Nanto, Toyama, this prewar storehouse was listed for one thing above all: what its walls do for the street.
A 1934 timber town hall in Imizu, Toyama, registered in 2014, decorated with acanthus and phoenix reliefs by plasterer Takeuchi Genzo, now a museum of his work.
The former main building of Tanaka Elementary School in Namekawa, Toyama, built in 1936, is a 60-metre timber school with Art Deco motifs in ceilings and fittings.
Completed in 1928 at Yasui in Nanto, Toyama, this registered wooden house kept an unfinished second floor that leaves its roof frame and eaves levers open to view.