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 17 m early Showa stone wall at the old Aikawa tax office, Sado: fitted rhyolite up to 2.6 m high on the lane, rough walling with mine waste rock. Registered 2009.
A two-story record store of about 1931 behind the old Aikawa tax office on Sado, with mortar walls, iron shutters and a king post truss roof. Registered in 2009.
A 1931 two-story timber tax office on Nagasaka in Aikawa, Sado, with a symmetrical front: central gambrel roof, gabled end bays, tall windows. Registered in 2009.
Early Showa concrete gateposts and a low side wall before the old Aikawa tax office on Sado, with a karato-men chamfer and washed mortar finish. Registered 2009.
Raised in 1928 at the back of the Ariake plot in Niigata, this L-shaped wing turns board cladding, latticed windows and log rafters toward a narrow lane.
Villagers in the Niigata hills built this wooden gymnasium themselves in 1952. Its timber truss is open to view, and a mezzanine etiquette room juts over the hall.
Standing alone at the north, this single-storey rice storehouse shows a king-post truss inside and reopened in 2020 as a fermentation museum and cafe.
Attached at the rear of the main house, this two-storey timber parlor greets guests through a cusped-gable porch and opens two garden-facing sides in glass.
The Former Kobayashi Kokei Residence, a 1934 sukiya house by Yoshida Isoya for the painter Kobayashi Kokei, was moved from Tokyo to Takada Castle Site Park in 2001.
A 1927 classical bank in Niigata faced in granite with four Ionic columns, moved in 2003 to the grounds of the Niigata City History Museum and registered in 2005.
The former Daishi Bank manager's house in Murakami, Niigata, built in 1936 for a credit union chairman, is a timber house with a carriage porch and fine wood inside.
Built around 1947, two years after the Nagaoka air raid, this merchant house keeps a gangi snow arcade and a sukiya alcove of bamboo and polished logs. Listed 2018.
A 1938 timber house in Niigata City combining corridor circulation with upstairs reception rooms, registered in 2006. Privately owned; exterior viewing only.
The youngest of Komatsuya Ryokan's registered buildings: a 1957 two-storey guest wing set in garden at Iwamuro Onsen, with zelkova stairs and bark-edged posts.
The 1951 front building of Komatsuya Ryokan at Iwamuro Onsen, Niigata: a projecting hip-and-gable porch, a roof that changes form end to end, 3 upstairs rooms.
The Sakata residence main house in Gosen, Niigata, once home to village headmen. Its 20-metre frontage and hipped-and-gabled roof mark a wealthy farming family's rank.
The Sakata family's timber new storehouse in Gosen, Niigata. Exposed close-set pillars and a black-plaster dado mark an unusually careful early-Showa kura.
A compost and livestock shed at the Sakata grounds in Gosen, Niigata. Rough walls and an exposed frame make this rare working building part of a wealthy farmstead.
An earthen-walled storehouse on the Sakata grounds in Gosen, Niigata. Thick plastered walls and closely set pillars make a fireproof dozo, unlike the timber kura nearby.
The Sasaguchi Family Main House in Niigata, built in 1935 for a sake-brewing family, is a large modern Japanese house with fine tatami rooms and an Art Deco room.