A Meiji Brewery Building at the Back of the Ogawa Compound
The Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House (小川酒造ビン詰場, also written Ogawa Shuzo Binzumeba) is a Meiji-period sake brewery building at 1969 Kawaharamachi in Kurayoshi City, Tottori Prefecture, entered on Japan's national register of Tangible Cultural Properties on 9 October 1998. It stands at the rear of the Ogawa family compound, reached by walking the length of the tōriniwa, the earth-floored service corridor that runs from the street through the main house and out to the yard behind.
The registered specification records a two-storey dozō: a structure whose timber frame is packed with thick layers of earth and finished in lime plaster, roofed in tile, covering 218 square metres. That footprint makes it the largest of the seven Ogawa brewery buildings taken onto the register that day. A lean-to roof, a shitaya, extends over the working area along the west side, and this is the practical clue to how the place was used. Bottles, crates and hands needed shelter and daylight rather than an impressive frontage.
One inconsistency inside the national record deserves flagging. The structural field gives a two-storey earthen-walled building; the commentary attached to the same entry describes a single-storey timber brewery carrying a double-beam wagoya roof truss. The two descriptions do not agree with each other, and the registered specification is the structural field.
The Ogawa family had been brewing on this ground since the late Edo period under the shop name Nakaeya. During the Meiji era they expanded into silk reeling and later into soy sauce, and their sake was sold under the label Utsubuki Masamune. A bottling room on this scale belongs to that stage of the business, when glass began replacing casks as the way sake left a brewery and the family was shipping well beyond its own district.
What the 1998 Registration Recognises
Japan sorts its protected buildings into tiers, and the distinction matters when reading any signboard here. National Treasures (kokuhō) and Important Cultural Properties (jūyō bunkazai) are designated: a strict status with tight controls on alteration and substantial state support. Registered Tangible Cultural Properties (tōroku yūkei bunkazai) belong to a lighter category introduced in 1996 for buildings around fifty years old or more that give a place its character. Owners retain considerable freedom to use and adapt them, which is why the system fits working buildings: breweries, warehouses, shopfronts.
The Bottling House holds registration number 31-0030 and was handled in the fourteenth round of registrations, the notice appearing in the official gazette on 26 October 1998. The criterion applied was that the building sets a standard for its type of design. Six other structures on the same site were registered on the identical date: the main house, the pressing house, the tool storehouse, the two-storey storehouse, the three-storey storehouse and the old brewing storehouse.
Protection later deepened. On 7 April 2015 Tottori Prefecture designated the Ogawa Residence, ten items in total, as a Prefectural Protected Cultural Property, and the Bottling House is counted among the ten. The prefectural assessment treats the compound as a core surviving example of the merchant-industrialist household in central Tottori, where each successive addition records the architectural taste of its decade.
A note for researchers: the Agency for Cultural Affairs database continues to list the 1998 registration, while the city of Kurayoshi's own published list of nationally registered properties, current to June 2021, does not include the Ogawa brewery buildings. Anyone citing the status for formal purposes should confirm the present position with the city's cultural properties division.
Seeing the Building Today
The compound stopped being an ordinary private address in 2026. On 17 July that year the Ogawa Residence, together with the former Takata Residence a short walk away, reopened as Kazeno Kurayoshi, a dispersed hotel of eleven rooms with its reception desk inside the Ogawa main house at 1969 Kawaharamachi. One guest room occupies the upper floor of the three-storey storehouse nearby. The Bottling House is neither a guest room nor an exhibit, and the prefectural record still lists the residence as closed to the public. Arriving without a booking, expect to see the buildings from outside.
That is worth doing. Kawaharamachi follows the right bank of the Ogamo River and forms the western end of the old merchant town. From the street the roofscape behind the main house reads clearly: red Sekishū tiles above white plastered walls. Those tiles are the signature of the San'in coast, fired above 1,200 degrees with an iron-rich glaze that produces both the colour and a resistance to frost damage that matters in snow country. Photography from the public road raises no issue. Anything past the gate is the hotel's to decide, so ask at reception first.
Fifteen minutes on foot to the east, the same street delivers you into the Utsubuki-Tamagawa Preservation District, selected as an Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings in 1998 and enlarged in 2010. Around forty white-walled storehouses line the Tamagawa channel there, crossed by single-slab stone bridges. The Ogawa compound is the quieter bookend of that walk, and the contrast is instructive: Tamagawa shows the polished face of Kurayoshi's merchant wealth, Kawaharamachi shows where the work happened.
Reaching it is simple. From JR Kurayoshi Station, take a Nihon Kōtsū bus on the Hirose line and alight at Kawaharamachi, then walk about five minutes. Hotel guests can arrange a shuttle from the station, roughly fifteen minutes by car. Drivers should know that the road in front operates one-way between 7:00 and 17:00 and cannot be entered from the east, so the approach is from the western side.
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Q&A
- Can I go inside the Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House?
- No. Tottori Prefecture's cultural property record lists the Ogawa Residence as closed to the public, and the Bottling House is not among the rooms opened as hotel accommodation. The exterior can be viewed from the public street at any time.
- What is the Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House and when was it built?
- It is the bottling building of a former sake brewery in Kurayoshi, Tottori Prefecture, dated to the Meiji era (1868 to 1912) in the national record. It measures 218 square metres and was registered as a Tangible Cultural Property on 9 October 1998.
- Is the Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House still a working sake brewery?
- No. Brewing has ceased at the site. Since 17 July 2026 the Ogawa Residence has operated as part of Kazeno Kurayoshi, a heritage hotel with its reception in the main house and eleven guest rooms spread across two historic properties.
- How do I reach the Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House from JR Kurayoshi Station?
- Take a Nihon Kōtsū bus on the Hirose line from the station and get off at the Kawaharamachi stop; the compound is roughly five minutes on foot. By car the journey takes about fifteen minutes, approaching from the west because of the one-way restriction in force between 7:00 and 17:00.
- Is the Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House part of the Kurayoshi white-walled storehouse district?
- It stands just outside it. The Utsubuki-Tamagawa Preservation District begins about fifteen minutes' walk east along the same street. The Ogawa compound marks the western end of the historic merchant town and is protected separately, through national registration and prefectural designation.
Basic Information
| Name | Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House (小川酒造ビン詰場 / おがわしゅぞうびんづめば) |
|---|---|
| Location | 1969 Kawaharamachi, Kurayoshi City, Tottori Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure), registration number 31-0030; also part of the Tottori Prefectural Protected Cultural Property "Ogawa Residence" |
| Year Designated | Registered 9 October 1998 (gazetted 26 October 1998); prefectural designation 7 April 2015 |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Two-storey earthen-walled (dozō) construction, tiled roof, building area 218 m² |
| Owner | Private (owner name not published in the national record) |
| Public Access | Interior closed to the public; exterior visible from the street. Reception of the Kazeno Kurayoshi hotel occupies the main house on the same site |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00000890
- Cultural Heritage Online: Ogawa Shuzō Bottling House
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/185620
- Tottori Prefecture Cultural Property Navigator: Ogawa Residence
- https://db.pref.tottori.jp/bunkazainavi.nsf/bunkazai_web_view/81801E062D55083349257E200010AB92
- Kurayoshi City: List of Nationally Registered Cultural Properties
- https://www.city.kurayoshi.lg.jp/4237.htm
- Kazeno Kurayoshi (official site)
- https://www.kazenoheritage.jp/hotels/kurayoshi/
- Kurayoshi Tourism: White-Walled Storehouses of Utsubuki-Tamagawa
- https://www.kurayoshi-kankou.jp/kurayoshi_area/shirakabedozogun/
Last verified: 2026.08.21