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 tiny gabled water pavilion of about 1933 with a coffered ceiling, tie beam, three-block brackets and carved struts, matching the Bell Tower opposite it.
Completed in 1953, this five-story reinforced concrete former university library is a fine example of postwar modernist architecture, cleverly designed with tall narrow windows to appear as a three-story building. Registered as a National Tangible Cultural Property in 2014, it stands on the Tsuchitoi Campus of Tohoku Gakuin University in Sendai, forming part of a historic academic ensemble with the Main Hall and Chapel.
The Iwanuma Church in Miyagi, a stone chapel of 1930, has bare masonry walls, pointed-arch windows, a pyramidal tower and a ceiling raised on hammer beams.
Fubokaku Palace Building, or Aone Goten, a 1932 pavilion built for the former Date lords' kin: copper roof with chidori gables, raised main room, lattice ceiling.
Fubokaku Gate, an early Showa munamon at an Aone Onsen inn: a 2.7-metre gabled gate with wing walls and a wicket door, tied to the Date lords' bath stewards.
Completed in 1941 on Tohoku University's Katahira campus, this concrete hall honours Kotaro Honda, who developed KS magnet steel. It was registered in 2021.
A tiny lignite store of about 1950 at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory, open on its yard side with a loading door facing the street. Registered 2019 with the boiler.
A building of about 1934 at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory: a trussed store of exposed Akiu stone for soybeans, with a timber weighing shed behind. Registered 2019.
An early Showa staff break room at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory: one mortar-floored room under a pantiled gable, glazed on both sides. Registered in 2019.
An early Showa garage for delivery vans at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory: a timber shed whose full-width front closes with a steel shutter. Registered in 2019.
A single-storey building of about 1934 at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory, where packed natto ferments in small rooms along a trolley track. Registered in 2019.
The core building of Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory, about 1934: a two-storey office joined to a trussed workroom where natto is still made. Registered 2019.
A timber boiler house of about 1950 at Sendai's Miyagino Natto Factory, holding a brick lignite-fired boiler and chimney that heated the soybeans. Registered 2019.
Moritami Sake Brewery Chimney in Iwadeyama, Miyagi, is an early Shōwa brick stack 16 metres tall on a 1.5-metre base, laid in English bond with a band of dark brick.
Moritami Sake Brewery Detached Room in Iwadeyama, Miyagi, is a retirement house of about 1935 with a glazed veranda, apparently now the Showa Retro Museum.
Main building of 1936 at Yusaya Ryokan, keeper of Naruko Onsen's Taki-no-yu, with rooms for long-stay bathers below and the best rooms upstairs on the street side.
A shed of about 1945 on the Yusa farmstead in Naruko Onsen, Miyagi, used for firewood and building materials, with one open bay and plank walls. Registered 1998.
A hot-spring bathhouse beside the Yusa farmhouse in Naruko Onsen, Miyagi: a concrete tub under a simple timber shelter, a community bath when registered in 1998.
An early Showa guest wing on the Yusa farmstead in Tome, Miyagi: two ten-mat rooms with alcoves and a writing bay, thatched roof, segai eaves. Registered 2006.
A stone cellar of about 1935 cut into a slope on the Yusa farmstead in Naruko Onsen, Miyagi: dressed-stone walls, arched concrete roof, used for pickling vegetables.