Onoguchi Family Residence

What Is the Onoguchi Family Residence?

The Onoguchi Family Residence (小野口家住宅, Onoguchi-ke Jūtaku) is the estate of a family of Edo-period village headmen in Tanomachi, Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture, where seven structures built of Ōya stone stone, from a rear storehouse of 1825 to a stone wall of the mid-Taisho era, were listed as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties in 1999 and 2006.

For generations the Onoguchi family served as Shōya, the headman who spoke for the village to the domain authorities. The national database uses the western Japanese term shōya; Utsunomiya City uses nanushi, the word more common in eastern Japan. Either way, the estate is read as a typical example of how a prosperous farming family laid out its compound on the edge of Utsunomiya: a main house in the middle of a large plot, ringed by storehouses, work buildings and a gatehouse.

The main house itself is not part of the listing. It had already been rebuilt by the time of the 1999 registration, so what the Onoguchi Family Residence protects today is the ring of outbuildings and the wall that ties them together.

Seven Listings in Two Rounds

Six buildings were registered together on October 14, 1999: the nagayamon gatehouse, the front storehouse, the former drying shed, the compost shed, the rear storehouse and the former sake brewery. They carry consecutive registration numbers, 09-0014 to 09-0019, and all six were listed under the criterion that they serve as models of architectural form.

The stone wall followed on October 18, 2006, as No. 09-0152. It was registered under a different criterion, as a structure that contributes to the historic landscape of the country. In other words, the six buildings were valued for their individual design, while the wall was valued for the way it holds the whole estate together when seen from outside.

The Onoguchi Family Residence is a private home that the owners continue to live in and maintain.

Layout and Building Sequence

The descriptions from the Agency for Cultural Affairs make it possible to sketch the plan. The nagayamon stands on the southwest side of the plot. The former drying shed adjoins it to the north, and the compost shed sits a little further north across a passage. The former sake brewery occupies the northernmost edge behind the main house, and the rear storehouse stands to the northeast behind the house. The front storehouse is set apart in the southeast corner. The stone wall links the buildings and encloses the estate on every side but the south.

In order of construction, the seven listed structures of the Onoguchi Family Residence run as follows.

• Rear storehouse: 1825, dated by an ink inscription, and the oldest building on the estate
• Front storehouse: late Edo period, moved to its present spot in the late Meiji era
• Former sake brewery: 1872, dated by an ink inscription
• Nagayamon gatehouse: 1876, dated by an ink inscription, and moved in one piece to its present site in the Taisho era
• Compost shed: estimated to date from the late Meiji era
• Former drying shed: mid-Taisho era, built when the gatehouse was moved
• Stone wall: mid-Taisho era

Two storehouses from the Edo period, three buildings from Meiji, and a shed and a wall from Taisho: the estate grew by increments over roughly a century. The mid-Taisho years stand out, since the gatehouse was shifted, the drying shed went up and the wall was built at about the same time. That appears to be when the outer face of the compound took its present form.

Ōya Stone and Its Neighbors

Tanomachi lies close to the quarries of Ōya, a volcanic tuff that is soft enough to saw yet resists fire, which is why so much of the Onoguchi Family Residence is built of stone. The family did not use a single type, though. Utsunomiya City's heritage notes list, alongside Ōya stone proper, Tage stone (田下石) from the foot of Mount Taki, Itabashi stone (板橋石) from the former city of Imaichi, now part of Nikko, and Tokujira stone (徳次郎石) from Tokujira-machi on the north side of Utsunomiya.

The stone went on in two ways. In one, a timber frame carries a skin of thin stone slabs. In the other, the walls are built up from solid blocks. The Edo storehouses and the early Meiji gatehouse and brewery follow the first method; the late Meiji compost shed and the Taisho drying shed follow the second.

The Onoguchi Family Residence is also one of the component properties of Utsunomiya's Japan Heritage story, "Exploring the Secrets of the Underground Labyrinth: Utsunomiya, a Town Where Ōya Stone Culture Lives On," which received Japan Heritage recognition in May 2018.

Visiting and Getting There

The Onoguchi Family Residence is a private house and is not open to the public on a regular basis. The Ōya Green Tourism Promotion Council describes visits as viewing from the outside. If you hope to step inside the grounds, contact the owners in advance through the telephone number given on the council's page and wait for their consent. No published rule on photography could be found; because the family lives here, ask before taking pictures inside the grounds.

The western run of the stone wall forms the front of the estate, and the gatehouse, the drying shed and the compost shed all line this side. If you are looking from outside, the west side is the place to start.

The estate lies about 10 kilometers west of JR Utsunomiya Station in a straight line, and about 2.1 kilometers west of Ōyaji Temple (Ōya Kannon). Kanto Jidosha buses bound for Tateiwa leave from the west exit of Utsunomiya Station and pass the Ōya Kannon-mae stop, but walking on from there takes more than 30 minutes. Check Kanto Jidosha's route search for a closer stop before setting out. No visitor parking is advertised, so if you come by car, plan in advance where to stop without blocking the lanes of this residential area.