Tajima Urushiten Former Factory New Storehouse

What the New Storehouse Is

The Tajima Urushiten Former Factory New Storehouse (田島漆店旧工場新蔵, shingura) is a 2-story clay-walled storehouse built in 1934 in Funao, Kainan City, Wakayama Prefecture, and it became a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on December 5, 2019. It stands in the northwest corner of the site, facing west, and its ground floor once held the raw lacquer, known as kiurushi, that the firm bought in for refining.

The storehouse covers 101 square meters. It is built in the Dozo-zukuri manner, with thick earthen walls, under a gabled (Kirizuma-zukuri) roof of Sangawara-buki pantiles, and a lean-to (Geya) is attached to the west side. Each of its 2 floors is a single open room.

Why It Was Registered

The Tajima Urushiten Former Factory New Storehouse was registered for contributing to the historic landscape. The Agency for Cultural Affairs singles out its former role as the store for raw lacquer and treats it as a building that shows how the lacquer factory was organized.

Why keep the raw material in a clay-walled kura? Wakayama Prefecture explains that kiurushi was expensive to buy and prone to spoiling in summer, so it was kept in this storehouse. Heavy earthen walls that buffer the building from outside conditions made it the chosen place for a costly, perishable material.

It is also well built. The prefecture describes it as a sturdy, high-quality storehouse with posts of fine Hinoki cypress. Behind the traditional exterior, the roof is carried on a King post truss, a triangulated Western frame that allows the upper floor to be a single room with few posts. Outside it is a traditional kura; under the roof it is framed in the Western manner.

What to Look For

The walls are finished in two parts: white Shikkui lime plaster above and vertical boards painted black along the base. It is the classic white-over-black look of a kura.

Pay attention to the windows. They are set high on both the gable ends and the long sides, fitted with iron shutters and iron bars, as you would expect of a store guarding valuable stock. Against that closed, defensive face, the west gable has a single round window filled with a decorative grille, the one playful note on the building.

The Product Storehouse, built 12 years before the Tajima Urushiten Former Factory New Storehouse, wears mortar-rendered brick with Western trim. The store for finished goods and the store for raw material look nothing alike, and the difference is worth noticing as you move around the site.

Visiting

According to Wakayama Prefecture, the Tajima Urushiten Former Factory New Storehouse is now used by local volunteers as a pottery studio. It stands on private land, and there is no notice of its interior being opened for visits (checked September 16, 2026). Because it is a working studio, do not go in while people are at work.

The exterior can be seen in the northwest corner once you are on the grounds, which are accessible during the hours of the on-site café and during events. Always ask permission before photographing the studio or the pottery made there. How to get there and when the grounds open are explained on the page for the Tajima Urushiten Former Factory as a whole.