Ishikawa Sake Brewery

Six Registered Buildings at a Sake Brewery Founded in 1863

Ishikawa Sake Brewery (石川酒造, Ishikawa Shuzō) is a sake brewery in Kumagawa, Fussa City, Tokyo, founded in 1863, whose six historic buildings (the Hongura, Shingura, Mukaigura, Zatsugura, Nagayamon Gate and Bunkogura) were all registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on February 17, 2004. The company trades in English as Ishikawa Brewery, and its sake label is Tamajiman.

The brewery's own history says brewing began in 1863, when the thirteenth head of the family, Ishikawa Wakichi, rented a storehouse from the Morita brewery in Ogawa village, across the Tama River in what is now Akiruno. The family moved production to this plot in Kumagawa in 1880 and built the Hongura that year. The first brand was Yaezakura; it became Yaeume in 1919 and has been Tamajiman since 1933.

Each head of the family takes the hereditary name Ishikawa Yahachirō, and that name is still on the nameplate of the Nagayamon Gate. The family also kept some 65,000 documents, from Edo-period village records to brewing ledgers and letters, and the Fussa City Board of Education published a catalogue of them in 2010.

The Six Buildings of Ishikawa Sake Brewery in Order of Age

The six buildings of Ishikawa Sake Brewery were entered together in the 40th round of registrations, as numbers 13-0165 to 13-0170. Oldest first, they are:

• Bunkogura (1863): a former treasure store, dated by ink writing on its internal staircase
• Nagayamon Gate (late Edo period): a single-storey gatehouse with rooms either side of the passage
• Hongura (1880): the two-storey brewing hall where sake is still made
• Mukaigura (1896): built as a coal shed, now housing the beer brewery on its ground floor
• Shingura (1898): a long storehouse running along the street
• Zatsugura (about 1898): a former rice store, with the company museum upstairs

The Hongura, Shingura and Mukaigura are all dated by their Munafuda, the wooden ridge tablets fixed in the roof at completion. The Bunkogura was registered as a model of form and design; the other five were registered for their contribution to the historic landscape.

Beer is part of the story too. In 1887 the brewery started making lager and sold it as JAPAN BEER in the surrounding villages, Tokyo and Yokohama, but bottles burst too easily and the equipment was sold in 1890. Beer returned in 1998 with the Tama no Megumi range, and it is brewed today on the ground floor of the Mukaigura.

How the Ishikawa Sake Brewery Site Is Laid Out

Read together, the Agency for Cultural Affairs descriptions place the buildings like this. The Zatsugura stands roughly midway along the southern edge of the property, facing the street. North of it, set back from the road and facing south, is the Nagayamon Gate, with the small Bunkogura just to its east. The Shingura runs along the street on the west side of the Hongura, and the Mukaigura stands toward the western part of the site.

Visitors enter beneath the large Tamajiman signboard and check in at the Sakesera shop. Inside the grounds is the Ishikawa family zelkova, designated a natural monument by Fussa City in 1990, with shrines to Daikokuten and Benzaiten at its roots. The site also holds a small building housing the Meiji-era beer kettle and a water channel drawn from the Tamagawa Aqueduct between 1886 and 1890.

All six buildings share white Shikkui plaster walls, but their roofs differ. The Hongura and Shingura each combine a Kirizuma-zukuri gable at one end with an Irimoya-zukuri hip-and-gable at the other. The Nagayamon Gate is roofed in copper, the Shingura in steel sheet, and the other four in tile. The largest is the Hongura at 734 square meters of building area; the smallest is the Bunkogura at 58 square meters.

Visiting Ishikawa Sake Brewery: Self-Guided Walk, Guided Tour and Museum

During opening hours anyone may walk the grounds of Ishikawa Sake Brewery without booking or paying. There is no guide on this self-guided walk; pick up the pamphlet with QR codes at the Sakesera shop and follow it around the buildings. The shop is open between 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. and closes on Tuesdays (except in December), and tours are also suspended on Tuesdays.

The guided tour must be booked in advance. It starts at 11:00 a.m., 1:00 p.m. or 3:00 p.m., lasts about 45 minutes and costs 500 yen per person, including a tasting of three sakes. Groups of 5 to 14 are accepted, and on weekends and holidays the brewery will also take parties of 4 or fewer. Bookings go through the shop (042-530-5792) or the website form and are not confirmed on the same day. The tour is given in Japanese only, the brewery does not allow interpreters during it, and actual brewing work is not shown.

The museum on the upper floor of the Zatsugura is free. According to the brewery it opens between 11:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. and closes on Wednesdays. Access to the individual buildings varies: some, such as the Bunkogura, are not open to the public at the front.

Getting to Ishikawa Sake Brewery

The nearest station to Ishikawa Sake Brewery is Haijima, served by the JR Ome, Itsukaichi and Hachiko lines and the Seibu Haijima Line. The brewery puts the walk at about 20 minutes, or about 8 minutes by taxi. From Shinjuku, take a Chuo Special Rapid to Tachikawa (about 27 minutes) and change to an Ome Line rapid for Haijima (about 12 minutes).

By car, leave the Chuo Expressway at Hachioji Interchange, follow Route 16 toward Kawagoe for about 15 minutes, and turn left at the Musashinobashi-minami intersection; the brewery is about 2 minutes further. The company gives its address as 1 Kumagawa, Fussa, while the national database lists 1-1 Aza-Minami, Oaza Kumagawa.