The Other Half of a Meiji Household
The Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing (真木家住宅日本館, Maki-ke Jūtaku Nihonkan, also written Maki-ke Jutaku Nihonkan) is a single-storey timber house at Kamiishiwara in Chōfu City, western Tokyo, built around 1910 in the late Meiji period and entered on Japan's national register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 28 April 2000.
Read that name carefully. Nihonkan means "Japanese building", and the word only makes sense because there is a yōkan, a Western building, on the same plot. The two were designed together, moved together and registered together on the same April day. This one is the quieter half: one storey, a hipped roof of grey pantiles, a building area of 93 square metres against the Western wing's 151.
The Agency for Cultural Affairs record places it east of the Western wing, facing south, and joined to it by a watari-rōka, a roofed corridor open at the sides that runs between separate buildings. A shoin reception room occupies the southeast corner, the position that catches winter sun through the morning and into the afternoon. The record's assessment of the construction is unusually direct: the materials and the workmanship are both of high quality.
Neither building started here. Both were dismantled in Shirokane, in what is now Minato Ward, and rebuilt at Kamiishiwara in 1937.
Why Two Houses Stood Side by Side
The arrangement has a name in Japanese architectural history: wakan-yōkan heizon jūtaku, a residence in which a Japanese building and a Western building coexist. It appeared among the Meiji elite and lasted, in various forms, into the early twentieth century. The Agency for Cultural Affairs calls the Maki pair a valuable example of the type from the late Meiji years, and that judgement is the core reason this wing carries a listing of its own rather than being treated as an outbuilding of the other.
The logic behind the split was social. An official or army or navy officer of the period was expected to receive foreign guests and Japanese colleagues in Western rooms, with chairs, tables and glazed windows, and to conduct that side of life in shoes. Family life continued on tatami, in rooms measured by mat and divided by paper screens, entered in stockinged feet. Rather than force one architecture to do both jobs, wealthy households built two buildings and connected them.
The corridor is therefore not a detail. It is the hinge of the whole plan, the point where a household changed footwear, register and posture several times a day. When the pair was taken apart in Shirokane and put back together in Chōfu, that relationship between the two buildings was preserved, which is a large part of why both survived the assessment.
A shoin room, the type occupying this wing's southeast corner, developed from the studies of medieval warrior and priestly residences and became the standard formal room of the Japanese house. The convention includes an alcove for a hanging scroll, staggered shelves, and a built-in desk alcove beneath a window, though the elements vary from house to house and the official record does not itemise which are present here. What the record does emphasise is timber selection and joinery, the aspects a carpenter would notice first and a photograph shows least.
The roof form is worth naming as well. Yosemune, a hipped roof, slopes on all four sides rather than meeting in gables, and the covering is sangawara, the interlocking pantile that became the ordinary roofing of Japanese towns from the eighteenth century onward. Both are conventional choices. Set against the brick facing and octagonal bay window of the building next door, the restraint reads as deliberate.
A City Mansion on an Old Highway
Kamiishiwara in 1937 was not the suburb it is now. The settlement grew along the Kōshū Kaidō, the Edo-period highway running west from Nihonbashi toward Kōfu, and remained farmland well into the twentieth century. What had changed by the 1930s was the railway. Keiō trains had been stopping here since September 1916, at a station then called Kamiishiwara after the district, and Shinjuku was already within easy reach. A family leaving Shirokane could move eighteen kilometres west without leaving Tokyo behind.
One point needs flagging for anyone checking addresses. The national database gives this wing as 2-48-4 Kamiishiwara, while Chōfu City's own list of cultural properties gives 2-48-22. The Agency for Cultural Affairs record is the authoritative source and is followed here, but the discrepancy is real and worth knowing about before navigating. The Western wing is listed consistently at 2-48-21 in both.
Access is the same for both buildings: Nishi-Chōfu Station on the Keiō Line, roughly six minutes on foot from the south exit, about twenty-three minutes out from Shinjuku. The station kept its old name until June 1959.
Set expectations before you go. This is an occupied private house. No opening hours, admission fee or tour arrangement is published by either the Agency for Cultural Affairs or Chōfu City, the owner field in the national database is blank, and the interior, including the shoin room that the listing turns on, cannot be seen. Registration confers no right of entry. Anyone passing should stay on the public road, keep off the grounds and refrain from photographing residents. Enquiries about the property go to the Local Museum of the Chōfu City Board of Education on 042-481-7656.
The walk around the neighbourhood is the real reward. The old highway still runs parallel to the railway on the south side, and Saikō-ji temple faces onto it in Kamiishiwara 1-chōme, its Niō gate and temple bell both Chōfu City designated cultural properties. Jindai-ji, a few kilometres north, holds the gilt bronze Hakuhō-period Buddha promoted to National Treasure in 2017. For an interior that can actually be entered, the former home of the writer Mushanokōji Saneatsu, registered in 2018 and open through the adjoining memorial museum, is the one to plan around.
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Q&A
- Can the Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing be visited?
- No. It is a privately owned, occupied house with no published opening hours, admission or tour programme, and the shoin room and interior cannot be seen. Visitors should stay on the public road, keep off the grounds and avoid photographing residents.
- What is the address of the Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing, and why do sources differ?
- The Agency for Cultural Affairs gives 2-48-4 Kamiishiwara, Chōfu City, Tokyo, while Chōfu City's own list records 2-48-22. The national database is the authoritative source. Nishi-Chōfu Station on the Keiō Line is about six minutes away on foot from the south exit.
- Why is the Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing registered separately from the Western wing?
- Registered Tangible Cultural Property status applies building by building, so each of the two received its own entry and number: 13-0086 for the Japanese wing, 13-0085 for the Western wing. Both were registered on 28 April 2000 under the criterion "a model of design".
- What makes the Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing significant?
- The Agency for Cultural Affairs values it as an example of the late Meiji residence in which a Japanese and a Western building coexist, and praises the quality of both the materials and the workmanship. The two buildings are linked by a covered corridor.
- Is the Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing an Important Cultural Property?
- No. It is a Registered Tangible Cultural Property, a lighter category created by a 1996 amendment to the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties, based on notification rather than permission. Important Cultural Property and National Treasure status are separate, stricter tiers.
Basic Information
| Name | Maki Family Residence Japanese Wing (真木家住宅日本館, Maki-ke Jūtaku Nihonkan) |
|---|---|
| Location | 2-48-4 Kamiishiwara, Chōfu City, Tokyo (Chōfu City's own list gives 2-48-22) |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure); registration number 13-0086; criterion "a model of design" |
| Year Designated | Registered 28 April 2000; gazetted 25 May 2000 (24th registration round) |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Single storey, timber frame, tiled roof, building area 93 m², with covered corridor |
| Owner | Privately owned; the owner field in the national database is left blank |
| Public Access | Not open to the public; interior not accessible |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Maki Family Residence Japanese Building
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00001661
- Cultural Heritage Online: Maki Family Residence Japanese Building
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/138931
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Maki Family Residence Western-Style Building
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00001660
- Chōfu City: List of Designated and Registered Cultural Properties (PDF)
- https://www.city.chofu.lg.jp/documents/2369/bunnkazai08.pdf
- Agency for Cultural Affairs: Registered Tangible Cultural Properties (Structures)
- https://www.bunka.go.jp/seisaku/bunkazai/shokai/yukei_kenzobutsu/toroku_yukei.html
Last verified: 2026.08.22