Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters

What Is Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters?

Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters (功運寺庫裏, Kōun-ji Kuri) is the residential and service building of Kounji, also known as Banshoin Kounji, a Soto Zen temple in Kamitakada, Nakano Ward, Tokyo; built in 1919, it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Building) of Japan in 2014. It is a single-story timber building with a hip-and-gable (Irimoya-zukuri) roof of pantiles (Sangawara-buki) and a footprint of 161 square meters.

A Kuri combines a temple's kitchen and office with the home of the resident priest and his family. Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters stands a little west of the center of the grounds, facing south. It went up in 1919, two years after Banshoin's main hall burned in 1917, and three years before the original Kounji moved here from Mita in 1922.

Why Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters Was Registered

Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters was registered for its contribution to Japan's historic landscape. The Agency for Cultural Affairs describes it as a carefully crafted example of modern Japanese-style architecture, and Nakano City sums it up in the same words.

What earns the praise is not structural novelty but a well-ordered plan and fine finishing. The official description makes a point of the innermost room, the hojo, which is built in the sukiya manner, the light, tea-house-inspired style of Japanese interiors. Bringing that touch into a working temple building is what marks the kuri as a piece of Taisho-era design.

Inside the Priests' Quarters: The Floor Plan

Following the Agency for Cultural Affairs description, you can walk through Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters from south to north. The entrance is on the south side, and stepping up you reach a 7-mat reception room where callers are received. From there a central corridor runs straight north, dividing the building into east and west halves.

On the east side of the corridor lie an 11-mat zashiki, the formal room for guests, and an 8-mat butsuma, the room for Buddhist rites. These are the temple's public-facing rooms, gathered together on one side. At the far north end is the 7-mat Hōjō, finished in sukiya style and quite different in mood from the formal rooms at the front.

A veranda runs around from the zashiki to the hojo, linking the front rooms with the inner one. The sequence of entrance, reception room, corridor, guest and ritual rooms, and finally the hojo can be read as a plan that keeps the side where visitors are received apart from the private rooms at the back.

Visiting Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters

Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters is both a residence and the temple office, and there is no notice that its interior is open to the public. The rooms described above cannot easily be seen from outside; for now, the plan is best appreciated through the official description.

The temple also does not say whether visitors may view the exterior. If you are inside the grounds, keep a respectful distance from the entrance of Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters and do not look in. Ask the temple about photography before taking pictures. Directions and general visiting notes are on the Kounji Temple page.