Taishō
大正Browse Japan’s cultural heritage from the Taishō period (1912 – 1926). Filter by prefecture, type, and keyword, with concise stories, maps, and travel tips.
The Matsusaka Tunnel of 1921 in Mugi, Tokushima, a straight concrete tunnel on the old coast road of south-east Shikoku, has three-centred arches finished in mortar.
The Yamashita Family Residence Annex, a Taisho town house in Tsuji, Miyoshi, shows udatsu firewalls and a curved roof and now serves as a community space.
Built in 1924 behind the family shop in Kauemon-cho, Tochigi City, this two-storey house glazes the whole south face of its upper verandah. Registered in 2004.
This 1924 shop on the old Nikko Reiheishi road in Tochigi City raises a tuff-stone gable above its roofline as a fire wall, an udatsu in stone. Registered 2004.
The Inari River Third Sabo Dam in Nikko (1921) runs 76 m straight across the valley; its broad 3.3 m crest shows how early dams were built to resist boulders.
The Inari River Tenth Sabo Dam in Nikko was built in 1923 at the mouth of a narrow gorge and enlarged in the Showa era, kept working through repeated rebuilding.
The Inari River Second Sabo Dam in Nikko (1920) is the oldest registered Inari dam, built of mortared stone after the First Dam washed away, with a rounded notch.
The Inari River Fourth Sabo Dam in Nikko (1921) is the lowest registered Inari dam at 3.6 m, framing a stepped view of the Second and Third Dams upstream.
The Inari River Sixth Sabo Dam in Nikko (1922) sits on andesite bedrock 2.8 km above the Daiya River and was built to ease the gradient from 9.9 to 5.4 percent.
The Ogawa Family Residence Fertilizer Storehouse in Oyama, Tochigi, is a 1913 storehouse with three large doors and a king post truss, built for a wholesaler.
A 174-meter mid-Taisho wall of stacked Oya stone linking the gatehouse and outbuildings of the Onoguchi estate in Utsunomiya, with small openings on its west crest.
A mid-Taisho single-story shed of stacked Oya stone beside the Onoguchi gatehouse in Utsunomiya, built to dry leaf tobacco, its doors facing inward. Listed in 1999.
At the deepest end of Itamuro Onsen in Nasushiobara, Tochigi Prefecture, Kadoya Ryokan Honkan stands as a rare survivor of a vanishing Japan. Built around 1919 in the eighth year of the Taisho era, this three-story wooden inn was registered as a Tangible Cultural Property in 2016. Its preserved third-floor row of six-mat guest rooms and its distinctive eastern balustrade evoke the atmosphere of an early-twentieth-century therapeutic spa, served by Itamuro's renowned alkaline waters once known as Shimotsuke no Yakuto.
Built between 1912 and 1918 for a hemp-spinning firm, this 55-metre stone storehouse in Kanuma pairs local Fukaiwa tuff with Oya stone above. Registered in 2014.
On the second bailey of Karasawayama Castle in Sano, Tochigi, the 1915 kagura hall of Karasawayama Shrine offers a copper-roofed stage for sacred dance.
Crossing a moat of Karasawayama Castle in Sano, Tochigi, the 1924 sacred bridge of Karasawayama Shrine is reinforced concrete disguised as a stone bridge.
The former Anjo main house of 1916 in Kanuma, Tochigi, a blended Japanese and Western home with a stone-look Western room and tatami room, is now a sports gym.
Koko Ichibankan in Tochigi City, a kimono merchant's shop of 1923 among the storehouse streets, wears a copper mansard roof with dormers and stone-faced pilasters.
The Sugita Sake Brewery Taishogura in Oyama, Tochigi, is a storehouse built around 1914 whose roof rests on a ladder-like frame of paired log beams, nearly as built.
Takagi Kaikan in Nasushiobara, Tochigi, built in 1918 as the head office of Kuroiso's first bank, is faced in Ashino and Oya stone with a light segmental pediment.