Koyasan Reihokan Museum

About Koyasan Reihokan Museum

Koyasan Reihokan Museum (高野山霊宝館, Kōyasan Reihōkan) is a temple treasure museum on Mount Koya in Koya Town, Wakayama Prefecture, completed in 1920, and five of its original buildings were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on September 2, 1998.

Over the centuries Koyasan lost a great deal of its art to fire, natural disasters and the anti-Buddhist purges of the early Meiji period. What survived was still enormous, scattered among the mountain's monasteries, and the museum was built to gather it, look after it and let pilgrims see it. Private donors and Kongōbu-ji, the head temple, paid for the work. Construction finished on September 30, 1920, and the opening ceremony took place on May 15, 1921. The abbot of Kongōbu-ji became the first director, and later abbots have held the post since.

The project was planned to mark the 1,100th anniversary of the founding of Koyasan. The Agency for Cultural Affairs names Ōe Shintarō and Okumoto Goichi as its designers and says the first scheme set the buildings out in the shape of the character 日, including a right wing that was never built. What went up is a single loop. A Central Corridor runs from the entrance back to the Shiunden hall, a North Corridor runs sideways to the Hōkōkaku pavilion, and an L-shaped run of South and West Corridors closes the circuit between those two. Because of the harsh mountain climate, every building except the storehouse was built of timber and finished in lime plaster.

The Five Registered Buildings of Koyasan Reihokan Museum

All five original buildings of Koyasan Reihokan Museum were registered on the same day, September 2, 1998. Each dates from 1920.

• Shiunden Hall: the main hall at the back of the complex. Single-storey timber, copper roof, building area 226 square meters.
• Entrance, North and Central Corridors: the reception block and the two walkways leading to the Shiunden and the Hōkōkaku, registered together. Single-storey timber, tiled roof, 147 square meters.
• Hōkōkaku: a gallery under a two-tiered pyramidal roof. Single-storey timber, copper roof, 126 square meters.
• South and West Corridors: an L-shaped gallery joining the Shiunden and the Hōkōkaku, with a small tower at the corner. Single-storey timber, sheet-iron roof, 203 square meters.
• Treasure Storehouse: a storehouse in the azekura log-store style and the only reinforced concrete building of the five. Copper roof, 96 square meters.

As the collection grew, the museum added buildings beside the old ones. The Koyasan Daihōzō storehouse, said at the time to be the largest in Japan, opened in 1961, a new storage and exhibition wing followed in 1984, and the Heisei Daihōzō in 2003. A new reception and office building was finished in 2005. None of these later structures is registered.

Since 1957 the museum has been run by the Koyasan Cultural Properties Preservation Society, which became a public interest incorporated foundation in 2013 and owns all five registered buildings. By the museum's own count, items designated by the state or the prefecture alone come to 188 entries and about 28,000 objects, and the total rises to about 100,000 with undesignated material. Koya Town's plan for maintaining its historic character also lists the five buildings of Koyasan Reihokan Museum as candidates for protection as historic landscape buildings.

Finding Your Way Through Koyasan Reihokan Museum

The floor plan on the museum's website sets out a one-way route. Starting at the entrance of Koyasan Reihokan Museum, you walk along the North Corridor into the Hōkōkaku, continue through the West Corridor, the corner tower and the South Corridor to the Shiunden, and then come back along the Central Corridor, where a connecting passage leads off to the 1984 wing. Since the four registered timber buildings are linked, simply following the exhibition takes you through the whole 1920 interior. The Treasure Storehouse is not on the route.

Each room has its own shape: a single space under the double roof of the Hōkōkaku, the broad gallery corridors to the west and south, and the large gabled hall of the Shiunden. It is worth glancing at the building itself each time one room gives way to the next.

The old buildings have no heating and plenty of steps. In winter, dress so that you can keep your coat on throughout. Wheelchairs are available, and staff will help if you ask at reception.

Hours, Admission and Photography at Koyasan Reihokan Museum

Koyasan Reihokan Museum is open year-round, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., with last entry at 4:30 p.m. It closes over the New Year holiday and occasionally for exhibition changes. Admission is 1,300 yen for adults, 800 yen for high school and university students with student ID, and 600 yen for elementary and junior high school students. Groups of 20 or more receive a discount.

Photography is banned in every gallery, phones included, and so is sketching. Large bags go in the lockers, and umbrellas stay in the stand outside. Displays rotate with each exhibition, so if you are coming for a particular statue or painting, ask the museum beforehand.

Getting to Koyasan Reihokan Museum

By rail, take the Nankai Koya Line to Gokurakubashi Station and the cable car up to Koyasan Station. The ride between Namba Station in Osaka and Gokurakubashi takes about 1 hour 25 minutes by limited express and about 1 hour 40 minutes by express. Travelers on the JR Wakayama Line change to the Nankai Koya Line at Hashimoto. From Koyasan Station, the Nankai Rinkan bus bound for Daimon stops at Reihōkan-mae, right by Koyasan Reihokan Museum. On a bus bound for Okunoin, get off at Senjuinbashi and walk about 10 minutes.

By car, Hashimoto is about 2 hours from Osaka, and the Koyasan Road climbs from there to the mountain top. A little past the Daimon gate, the museum's free parking lot is on the right.