The Room Where the Sake Was Pressed
The Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House (小川酒造槽場, also written Ogawa Shuzo Funaba) is a Meiji-period 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 along the Hachiya River at the back of the Ogawa family compound, joined in a continuous run with the old brewing storehouse next to it.
The name explains the function. A fune is the long box-shaped press in which cotton bags of fermented mash are stacked and squeezed, separating clear sake from the lees. The room housing that press is the funaba, and the step is called jōsō, the point at which months of fermentation finally yield liquid. Every brewery needed such a room, few kept them, and fewer still had them recorded before they went.
The registered specification gives a two-storey dozō, earth packed thickly around a timber frame and rendered in plaster, roofed in tile, covering 77 square metres. That is a small footprint beside the 218 square metres of the bottling house across the yard, and it should be. Pressing needs height and leverage, not floor area.
Look up inside and the point becomes visible. The roof is a wagoya, the Japanese post-and-beam truss, built here in three tiers of beams, and a pulley hangs within it. That pulley is the working heart of the room: the mechanism by which weight was applied to the stacked bags, hour after hour, as the pressing went on.
A Vanished Waterwheel and the Wall That Held It
The Hachiya River runs directly behind the building, and the national record notes something that has largely disappeared from Japanese brewing sites. A waterwheel once stood here, installed to draw power from the river. The wheel is gone. What survives is the channel cut to feed it and a section of brick walling built to carry the installation.
Brick is the detail to notice. In a compound otherwise built of timber, earth, plaster and tile, a brick wall marks the arrival of Meiji industrial technique into a family business with Edo-period roots. The Agency for Cultural Affairs record does not specify which task the wheel powered, and honest reporting stops there rather than filling the gap with a guess. Rice polishing and pumping are both plausible; neither is documented in the entry.
The river shaped the neighbour as well. The old brewing storehouse abutting the Pressing House was built in the Taishō era, covers 237 square metres, carries a king-post truss of Western type, and has its entrance on the Hachiya River side, an arrangement the national record connects to river transport. Read the two buildings together and a small logic emerges: water for power, water for carriage, and a brewery arranged to take both.
That is why the registration criterion applied to the Pressing House differs from the one applied to its neighbours. The Bottling House was registered as a model of design. The Pressing House was registered under a different heading, as a building that contributes to the historic landscape of the country. Its value was located in its relationship with the river rather than in its own elevation.
Status, Access and What a Visitor Can Actually See
Registration number 31-0032 was issued in the fourteenth round, with the gazette notice published on 26 October 1998, the same day as the six other Ogawa brewery buildings. Registered Tangible Cultural Property is the lighter of Japan's protective tiers, introduced in 1996 for buildings of around fifty years or more, and distinct from designation as an Important Cultural Property or National Treasure, which brings far stricter control. On 7 April 2015 Tottori Prefecture added a second layer, designating the Ogawa Residence and its ten component items as a Prefectural Protected Cultural Property; the Pressing House is one of the ten.
Researchers should note a gap in the paper trail. The Agency for Cultural Affairs database still carries the 1998 registration, while Kurayoshi City's published list of nationally registered properties, current to June 2021, omits the Ogawa brewery buildings. Confirm the current position with the city's cultural properties division before citing the status formally.
As for visiting, the compound became a hotel in 2026. Kazeno Kurayoshi opened on 17 July that year across the Ogawa Residence and the former Takata Residence, eleven rooms in total, reception in the Ogawa main house. The Pressing House is not among the guest rooms and is not an exhibit, and Tottori Prefecture's record lists the residence as closed to the public. Plan on an exterior visit unless you are staying.
The exterior repays a slow walk. From the street the red Sekishū tiles read against white plaster; Sekishū roofing originates in the Iwami district of Shimane, is fired above 1,200 degrees, and resists frost damage, which is why it covers the San'in coast. Follow the lane around toward the Hachiya River for the view that matters here, where the Pressing House and the old brewing storehouse present a single long wall to the water. Photography from public ground is fine; ask at reception before stepping onto the property.
To get there, take a Nihon Kōtsū bus on the Hirose line from JR Kurayoshi Station and alight at Kawaharamachi, five minutes on foot. Guests can arrange a hotel shuttle, about fifteen minutes by car. The road in front is one-way between 7:00 and 17:00 with no entry from the east, so drivers come around from the west side. Fifteen minutes' walk east brings you to the Utsubuki-Tamagawa Preservation District, selected in 1998 and extended in 2010, where roughly forty white-walled storehouses line the Tamagawa channel.
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Q&A
- What does the name Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House (funaba) actually mean?
- A funaba is the room holding the fune, the box-shaped press used to squeeze fermented sake mash and separate the liquid from the lees. The step is called jōsō. This building housed that operation for the Ogawa brewery in Kurayoshi.
- Can visitors enter the Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House?
- No. Tottori Prefecture lists the Ogawa Residence as closed to the public, and the Pressing House is not part of the accommodation at the Kazeno Kurayoshi hotel on the site. The exterior can be seen from the public lane and from the Hachiya River side.
- Is the waterwheel at the Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House still there?
- No. The wheel that once drew power from the Hachiya River has been lost. The water channel cut for it and a section of brick walling associated with the installation remain, and these are what the national record singles out.
- When was the Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House built and how large is it?
- The Agency for Cultural Affairs dates it to the Meiji era, 1868 to 1911, without a precise year. It is recorded as a two-storey earthen-walled building with a tiled roof and a building area of 77 square metres, registered on 9 October 1998.
- How do I reach the Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House from JR Kurayoshi Station?
- Take a Nihon Kōtsū bus on the Hirose line and get off at Kawaharamachi, then walk about five minutes. Driving takes roughly fifteen minutes; approach from the west, since the road in front cannot be entered from the east between 7:00 and 17:00.
Basic Information
| Name | Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House (小川酒造槽場 / おがわしゅぞうふなば) |
|---|---|
| Location | 1969 Kawaharamachi, Kurayoshi City, Tottori Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure), registration number 31-0032; 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 77 m² |
| Owner | Private (owner name not published in the national record) |
| Public Access | Interior closed to the public; exterior visible from the lane and the Hachiya River side. The Kazeno Kurayoshi hotel occupies other buildings on the same site |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Ogawa Shuzō Pressing House
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00000892
- Cultural Heritage Online: Ogawa Shuzō Old Brewing Storehouse (adjoining building)
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/138161
- 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/
- National Council for Preservation Districts: Kurayoshi Utsubuki-Tamagawa
- https://www.denken.gr.jp/archive/kurayoshi-utubukitamagawa/index.html
Last verified: 2026.08.21