Taishō
Tokyo · 大正Browse Tokyo’s cultural heritage from the Taishō period (1912 – 1926). Filter by type and keyword, with concise stories, maps, and travel tips.
Discover the Former Asakura House (Kyu Asakura House), an Important Cultural Property in Daikanyama, Tokyo. Built in 1919, this Taisho-era wooden mansion features elegant tatami rooms, detailed woodwork, and a stunning hillside strolling garden with stone lanterns and seasonal foliage.
Eitai Bridge over the Sumida in Tokyo, a steel tied-arch bridge of 1926 built after the Great Kanto Earthquake, had the longest steel arch span in Japan.
Completed in 1924 where the Arakawa splits from the Sumida, this concrete sluice by Aoyama Akira became an Important Cultural Property in 2024. Free to visit.
Built around 1915 in Bunkyo Ward and registered as a Tangible Cultural Property in 2025, this timber house pairs Japanese rooms with a Western wing. Not open.
The Echiso Building on Hongo-dori, Tokyo, a thread merchant's concrete corner building of the late Taisho period, is decorated with dentils and window arches.
The Edoya shop in Nihonbashi, Tokyo, a 1924 kanban-kenchiku of a brush maker founded in 1718, has a washed-stone facade with brush motifs and owl reliefs.
Kajikaen Front Office and Main House (c.1925), by Mitake Station in Ome, held the front desk, kitchen and family rooms; alone of 8 it was listed for landscape.
The Kamiya Bar building of 1921 on a corner in Asakusa, Tokyo, six storeys of concrete, is marked by triple arched windows rising through two floors of the front.
The main house of the Kawahara Residence in Ota Ward, Tokyo, was assembled from an 1885 school building and carries that school's 1925 clock tower on top.
On Tokyo's Niijima, this 8.4-square-metre Taisho outbuilding holds a stone cooking hearth and a bath, its walls and roof cut from island pumice. Registered 2024.
The former Mitsui Bunko stacks of 1922 in a Shinagawa park, Tokyo, a concrete archive with double walls and floors on bookstack uprights, held Mitsui papers.
The Friends Center in Mita, Tokyo, a missionary house of 1922 by the Vories office with dormers and a brick chimney, is one of few Western houses older than 1923.
Kounji Temple Priests' Quarters in Nakano, Tokyo, is a 1919 kuri with a central corridor, guest and altar rooms and a sukiya-style hojo, registered in 2014.
Kounji Temple Main Gate in Nakano, Tokyo, is a 3.2-meter koraimon gate built in 1914 of fine zelkova, with lattice doors and side walls, and was registered in 2014.
Built in 1925, the National Astronomical Observatory Main Gate has four concrete posts faced in irregular stone, fluted capitals and a lamp over the central opening.
Completed in 1924 at Mitaka in Tokyo, this half-round concrete room holds a French meridian circle of 1903 on a foundation isolated from the building itself.
Standing 100 metres south of the meridian circle at Mitaka in Tokyo, this 1925 concrete box of 7.3 square metres exists to hold a single reference mark.
Completed in 1921, the oldest observing building on the Mitaka campus holds a 20-centimetre Zeiss refractor on a weight-driven mounting under a hand-cranked dome.
Built in 1926 and 19.5 metres tall, this Mitaka dome holds Japan's largest refractor at 65 centimetres and an observing floor that once rose and fell like a lift.
Standing 100 metres north of the meridian circle at Mitaka in Tokyo, this 1925 concrete box of 7.2 square metres is the twin of the mark room to the south.