Zaima Family Residence

What Is the Zaima Family Residence?

The Zaima Family Residence (財間家住宅, Zaima-ke Jūtaku) is a late Meiji-period (1898 to 1911) merchant townhouse on Honmachi-dori in Ushiroda, Tsuwano Town, Shimane Prefecture, whose seven buildings were registered together as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties of Japan on September 10, 2010.

The seven are the main house, the main gate, the Heya-no-kura storehouse, the pickle storehouse and firewood shed, the upper and lower storehouses, and the side gate. They carry the unbroken run of registration numbers 32-0120 to 32-0126. The garden of the house was registered in 2013 as the Zaima Family Garden, a Registered Monument (Place of Scenic Beauty).

The property lies almost due south of JR Tsuwano Station, on the east side of Honmachi-dori. The Agency for Cultural Affairs places it at the south end of the street, on the corner where Honmachi-dori becomes Tonomachi-dori, a site that held the public notice board in the Edo period. The main house faces west onto the street. The main gate and the Heya-no-kura stand to its north, a service wing runs out behind it, two storehouses line the east edge of the lot, and a side gate opens onto the lane along the south boundary.

A House Built Around a Liquor Shop

According to the description of the Zaima Family Garden on Cultural Heritage Online, the present main house of the Zaima family went up in 1899 as a home with a shop selling sake and other liquor. The Agency for Cultural Affairs dates all seven buildings of the Zaima Family Residence to the late Meiji period.

Later work varied from building to building. The main house, the pickle storehouse and firewood shed, and the upper and lower storehouses were altered in the early Showa period (1926 to 1945), and the main house was altered again in the mid-Showa period (1946 to 1965). No alterations are recorded for the Heya-no-kura or either gate.

A separately registered complex with a similar name, the Zaima Brewery (財間酒造場) in the Nakaza district at the south end of town, is a different property at a different address. Public records do not explain how, or whether, the two are connected.

How the Zaima Family Residence Is Laid Out

Tsuwano's board of education describes the typical townhouse on Honmachi-dori this way: a shop on the street, a storehouse and a front gate for guests beside it, and a courtyard garden behind. Larger lots, such as those of sake dealers, put a line of storehouses at the back and ran all the way to the rear street. The Zaima Family Residence follows that pattern closely.

On the street front stand the 15-meter-wide main house, the main gate with its short flanking walls, and the Heya-no-kura beyond the garden. The Agency for Cultural Affairs singles out these three as giving the property its dignified, solid street presence.

Behind the main house, the pickle storehouse and firewood shed runs east to west from the kitchen wing. The upper storehouse sits in the southeast corner and the lower storehouse just north of it, with a small room between them known as the hiai, used for pickle jars. The side gate, a plain service entrance, is squeezed between the pickle storehouse and the upper storehouse on the south lane.

The Zaima Family Garden was registered on August 1, 2013. It has a small forecourt inside the main gate and a main garden in front of the inner parlor and Buddhist altar room. A built-up mound at the far end of the main garden acts as a relay point for the eye, drawing the view from the parlor along the stepping stones toward Mount Aono outside the grounds. The garden has its own page with more detail.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs records the seven buildings as follows.

• Main house: late Meiji, altered early and mid-Showa. Two-story timber, tiled roof, building area 408 m²
• Pickle storehouse and firewood shed: late Meiji, altered early Showa. Single-story timber, tiled roof, building area 35 m²
• Upper storehouse: late Meiji, altered early Showa. Two-story earthen-walled storehouse, tiled roof, building area 35 m²
• Lower storehouse: late Meiji, altered early Showa. Two-story earthen-walled storehouse, tiled roof, building area 35 m²
• Heya-no-kura: late Meiji. Two-story earthen-walled storehouse, tiled roof, building area 23 m²
• Main gate: late Meiji. Timber, tiled roof, opening 1.7 m, with walls on both sides
• Side gate: late Meiji. Timber, tiled roof, opening 1.8 m

The main house was registered as a model of form and design. The other six were registered for their contribution to the historic landscape.

Visiting the Zaima Family Residence

The Zaima Family Residence is a privately owned home. Neither the Tsuwano board of education's cultural property portal nor the Tsuwano Tourism Association lists any opening of the interior or the garden (checked October 1, 2026), so a visit means looking from outside. From Honmachi-dori you see the front of the main house, the main gate and the street wall of the Heya-no-kura. From the lane on the south side you see the pickle storehouse and firewood shed, the side gate and the south wall of the upper storehouse. Please stay off the property and be considerate of the family when taking photographs.

The nearest station is Tsuwano on the JR Yamaguchi Line. The residence is about 600 meters due south of the station in a straight line, roughly an 8-minute walk down Honmachi-dori. The street belongs to the Tsuwano Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings, selected in 2013.