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.
Beside its eastern twin, Heian Jingu's West Saikiko is a 1940 two-story plaster storehouse for ritual vessels, with namako-style joints at its base and plastered eaves.
Behind Heian Jingu's sanctuary, the 1940 West Shinko is a small log-built sacred storehouse, strictly symmetrical with its eastern twin. A fine miniature azekura hut.
On the west of Heian Jingu's south court, the West Gate, or Shozenmon, and its L-shaped corridor enclose the court. Built in 1940, it mirrors the east side.
Behind Heian Jingu's sanctuary, the 1940 East Shinko is a small log storehouse about 3.6 meters square, its bare white wood standing out amid the vermilion precinct.
On the east of Heian Jingu's south court, the East Gate, or Senseimon, and its 50-meter corridor enclose the court, their vermilion frame and green lattice defining it.
Heian Jingu's South Walkway is a 1940 L-shaped passage tying the Soryuro and Byakkoro towers to the outer corridors, two bays wide with a latticed central wall.
Matsumoto Sake Brewery Mangyoin in Fushimi, Kyoto: a c.1954 family house of two staggered wings whose curved entrance reuses timber from Shoden-in at Kennin-ji.
An early Showa guest building of 95 square metres at Muko Shrine in Kyoto, T-shaped in plan, with a gabled porch and a formal eight-mat room at the back.
An early Showa hall at Muko Shrine in Kyoto, moved here around 1967. Three bays wide under a hipped gable, it borrows Kamakura-period forms for its struts.
Kodoan, the 15-mat practice hall of Mushakoji Senke in Kyoto, rebuilt in 1940 for Rikyu's 350th memorial, with a board by Konoe Fumimaro. Registered in 2004.
A bracket-roofed service gate and 28 metres of tiled wall enclose the west side of the Yamamoto property in Kyoto. Registered in 2007; viewable from the back lane.
A two-storey wooden house of about 1940 in Kamigyo Ward, Kyoto, holding an Art Deco reception room inside a plain Japanese exterior. Registered 2007; still lived in.
A timber gate 1.8 metres wide and 19 metres of tiled wall front the Yamamoto property in Kyoto, registered in 2007 and freely visible from the street at any hour.
An ink inscription inside this 20-square-metre storehouse in Kyoto records a ridge-raising in 1940, supplying the only firm date for the Yamamoto property.
Built in 1942 so the Konoe archive could be examined properly: a 393 m2 sukiya villa with the tea room Tekian, and the one Yomei Bunko building visitors enter.
The plainest of Yomei Bunko's four registered buildings, and the one that works: a 159 m2 wooden office with entrance lattice and a fireplace chimney.
Konoe Fumimaro raised this 73 m2 vault in 1938, before founding the archive itself: reinforced concrete disguised as a merchant's storehouse, lifted off the damp ground.
Two years after the First Repository, wartime shortages forced this 1940 vault to give up its raised floor. Its upper storey is where the treasures are shown.
The Front Gate of Yoshida Sanso is a 1932 hira-karamon 3.9 meters wide, credited by the ryokan to temple carpenter Nishioka Tsunekazu and visible from the lane.
The North Storehouse of Yoshida Sanso is a 1932 dozo storehouse of white plaster, linked to the Main Building and framed with sloping beams, unlike its twin.