The House Behind the Shop
The Amagai Family Residence Main House (天海家住宅主屋, Amagai-ke Jūtaku Shuoku) is a two-storey wooden dwelling of 1924 in Kauemon-chō, Tochigi City, Tochigi Prefecture, entered on the national list as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (登録有形文化財) in February 2004. It occupies the rear of a long, narrow merchant plot, set west of and behind the family's shop building, with its ridge running east to west.
The arrangement is the standard one for this street. Plots here run back a long way from a narrow frontage on the old highway, and the family put the commercial room at the front where customers were and the living quarters behind it, out of sight. The two are joined, and the entrance to the house sits in that junction, so anyone coming to visit the family rather than the business passed through the connecting section.
The core of the house measures four bays by two and a half, roughly 7.3 by 4.5 metres, and contains two rooms of eight tatami mats each. Total building area comes to about 85 square metres, nearly three times the footprint of the shop, with the extra floor area accounted for by a service wing pushed out from the southwest corner holding the lavatory, bath and kitchen.
The roof is a hipped gable, or irimoya, in sangawara pantile. Its softer profile distinguishes the house from the plain gable of the shop at the front.
A Wall of Glass on the Upper Floor
Registration was granted under the criterion of being a model of design, and the feature most often singled out is the treatment of the second storey.
Along the south face of the upper floor runs an engawa, the timber verandah that traditionally forms the transition between a Japanese interior and its garden. Here the whole outer face of that verandah is filled with glass doors.
Plate glass in domestic quantities was a genuinely new possibility in Japan in the early 1920s. Domestic manufacture had only become viable in the preceding decade, and until then a house closed itself off at night behind wooden shutters and admitted daylight through translucent paper screens. Glazing the entire south face changed the interior calculation. The upper rooms could be shut against weather and still be flooded with light, and the verandah, which had been a threshold, became a place to sit in winter. The Tochigi Prefecture cultural properties record describes the effect as an open construction.
Look at the house from the south and the difference in register between the two floors is immediate. The ground storey keeps to the enclosed language of a merchant dwelling. The floor above is close to transparent.
The prefectural record adds a detail the national database leaves out: the main house is said to meet the shop at an angle, the connection skewed to follow the shape of the plot rather than squared up to it. This is common enough on a street where boundaries were fixed centuries before the buildings that now sit on them, and it is worth watching for from the roadway, though the junction is largely hidden from public view.
The house carries registration number 09-0093 and was entered in the fortieth round of national registrations, alongside the shop and the storehouse on the same plot.
Seeing It, and Where to Go Next
The main house is privately owned and remains a home. It is not open to visitors, there is no admission charge and no opening hours are published. Because it stands behind the shop, it is also the least visible of the three registered Amagai buildings from the street. Visitors should expect glimpses of the roof rather than a clear view of the glazed verandah.
Tochigi Station, on the JR Ryōmō Line and the Tōbu Nikkō Line, lies about 1.6 kilometres south, some twenty minutes on foot. Shin-Tochigi Station on the Tōbu Nikkō Line is around a kilometre to the northeast. Rental bicycles can be hired in the city centre.
Photography from the public road is unrestricted. The building is occupied, so keep cameras away from windows and entrances and do not step onto the property.
The surrounding streets repay the walk more than any single building does. Kauemon-chō was designated an Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings in July 2012, the first such designation in Tochigi Prefecture, covering about 9.6 hectares and containing some 92 traditional structures. A guidance centre roughly two hundred metres north of the Amagai plot occupies a former miso factory and offers maps, displays and a free rest area, with opening days that vary through the year. Comparing the Amagai house with its neighbours is instructive: several of them experimented in the same decade with Western detailing, stone construction and larger openings, and the results sit side by side along a few hundred metres of road.
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Q&A
- Where is the Amagai Family Residence Main House and how do I reach it?
- It stands in Kauemon-chō, Tochigi City, Tochigi Prefecture, set behind the family's shop building on a plot facing the former Nikkō Reiheishi Kaidō. Tochigi Station on the JR Ryōmō Line and the Tōbu Nikkō Line is about 1.6 kilometres south, roughly twenty minutes on foot, and Shin-Tochigi Station on the Tōbu Nikkō Line is about a kilometre to the northeast.
- Is the Amagai Family Residence Main House open to the public?
- No. It is privately owned and still in use as a home, with no interior access, no admission fee and no published opening hours. It also sits behind the shop building, so it is only partly visible from the road.
- What makes the second floor of the Amagai Family Residence Main House distinctive?
- A verandah, or engawa, runs along the south side of the upper storey, and its entire outer face is fitted with glass doors. Plate glass in this quantity was newly available to Japanese housebuilders in the early 1920s, and glazing the whole face let the upper rooms stay bright while shut against the weather.
- How large is the Amagai Family Residence Main House?
- The building area is about 85 square metres. The main block measures four bays by two and a half, approximately 7.3 by 4.5 metres, and holds two rooms of eight tatami mats. A service wing containing the lavatory, bath and kitchen projects from the southwest corner.
- When was the Amagai Family Residence Main House registered, and what else on the site is listed?
- It was registered on 17 February 2004 and notified on 4 March 2004, as number 09-0093 in the fortieth round of registrations. The shop building of 1924 and the storehouse of 1895 on the same plot are separately registered as 09-0092 and 09-0094.
Basic Information
| Name | Amagai Family Residence Main House (天海家住宅主屋) |
|---|---|
| Location | Kauemon-chō 5 and others, Tochigi City, Tochigi Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structures), registration no. 09-0093 |
| Year Designated | Registered 17 February 2004; notified 4 March 2004 (40th round) |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Wooden, two storeys, tiled roof; building area approx. 85 m². Main block of 4 by 2.5 bays, hipped gable roof in sangawara pantile, two eight-mat rooms |
| Owner | Private |
| Public Access | Not open; partial exterior view from the public road |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Amagai Family Residence Main House
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00003790
- Cultural Properties of Tochigi Prefecture: Amagai Family Residence Main House
- https://bunkazai.pref.tochigi.lg.jp/cultural/【天海家住宅主屋】/
- Tochigi City: Kauemon-chō Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings
- https://www.city.tochigi.lg.jp/soshiki/5/1568.html
- National Council of Preservation Districts: Tochigi City Kauemon-chō
- https://www.denken.gr.jp/archive/tochigi-Kauemoncho/index.html
Last verified: 2026.08.04