Shōwa

Built in 1934 as the office of Morioka's first water plant, this timber hall with a dormer roof has shown waterworks history since 1984. Free, weekdays, by booking.

The central valve house of 1934 at Morioka's Yonai plant, whose round window, round vents and half-round vault face the filter bed like a little palace by the water.

An early Showa storehouse in Kamioka, Hida, Gifu, registered in 2014. It has two storeys and a basement, and a lean-to from the main house roofs the floor around it.

An early Showa board fence in Kamioka, Hida, Gifu, registered in 2014. Its 18 meters of yamato-bari boards and lattice windows turn a corner around a front garden.

The shamusho of Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine sits on a former Kiso River island in Gifu. This early-Showa office shows fine carpentry and joined the register in 2007.

A steeply arched stone drum bridge of 1936 crosses the pond before the worship hall at Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine. Carved railings render timber forms in stone.

The purification pavilion at Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine fills seven square metres, packing chamfered posts and carved beam-ends into one bay. An early-Showa work.

The great torii of Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine rises 8.2 metres, its timber frame sheathed in copper. Raised in 1935, it carries the plain Shinmei form at rare scale.

A banpei screens the worship hall, a feature of old Owari shrines. This rare stone example of 1937, carved with dragons and lions, recalls Kawashima's Owari past.

The Heiden (offering hall) of Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine in Kakamigahara, Gifu Prefecture, was completed in 1929 (Showa 4). This single-story wooden structure with copper-plate roofing measures three bays square in an irimoya-zukuri tsumairi style and was registered as a Tangible Cultural Property in 2007. Together with the surrounding shrine buildings from the same period, it stands as a valuable example of early Showa rural shrine architecture marked by restrained yet dignified craftsmanship.

The Main Hall of Kaminoshima Shinmei Shrine in Kakamigahara City, Gifu Prefecture, is a finely crafted wooden sanctuary built in 1928 in the hamaen-tsuki ichigensha nagare-zukuri style. Registered as a National Tangible Cultural Property in 2007, it showcases superb carvings of auspicious dragons and clouds that exemplify early Showa shrine architecture.

North wing of the Kamiyama Residence in Tajimi, an early-Showa addition to the main house holding the kitchen, topped by a gabled roof vent, part of the estate core.

North storehouse of the Kamiyama Residence in Tajimi, an early-Showa wooden building said by tradition to have housed the household staff, in exposed-pillar work.

The Kawai Family Villa Main House in Hida-Furukawa, Gifu, is a sukiya-style house of about 1941 built in an H plan around an older storehouse, facing a front garden.

The Kawai Family Villa Gate and Wall in Hida-Furukawa, Gifu, is a 1941 roofed gate and a 41-meter board fence with windows, the street face of a private villa.

The newest of six registered buildings on the Kitaokada estate in Ono, Gifu: a 1928 barn with a grain room and an earthen pickle room, plastered inside and out.

Built in 1941 in Mino City, Gifu Prefecture, the Former Mino-cho Industrial Hall is the city's largest surviving modern wooden building and a National Registered Tangible Cultural Property. It features tile-clad lower walls, lap-board upper siding, decorative yoraku ornaments under the front eaves, and continuous horizontal window bands. Today it serves as the Mino Washi Akari Art Museum, displaying handmade washi paper lamp art year-round.

A 1928 household storehouse behind the main house of a Yoro sake brewery in Gifu, walled in black plaster with a Shu-brocade pattern and stepped fireproof doors.

Tucked inside Kumano Shrine in the Kurose district of Yaotsu, Gifu Prefecture, the Mekakushi-mon ('screening gate') is a quietly distinctive structure from the early Showa period, registered as a national Tangible Cultural Property in 1998. Built to shield the sacred precinct from view, it stands at the heart of an old Kiso River port town and at the starting point of the 300-year-old Yaotsu Danjiri Festival.

Early Showa single-bay yakuimon gate of the Kojima house in Narukiyo, Kakamigahara, 2.3 m wide, with a clamped crossbeam and a finned, heart-pierced gable pendant.