Water Tower at the Former Matsui Family Villa (Ganko

A brick water tower among timber halls

North of the main house stands a small brick tower, two stories under a single-pitch roof of sheet iron. It is the estate's water tower, the piece of plumbing that gave a large early-twentieth-century household running water. Built in the late Taisho years, between 1919 and 1926, it covers about 18 square meters. The roof frame carries its rafters across the short span, a plain solution for a utilitarian structure.

What sets it apart is its dress. A cornice runs below the eaves; each face of the upper story holds a pair of double-hung sash windows; and bands of white tile mark the top and bottom edges. In a compound built mainly of timber and earth, this frankly Western, frankly modern building was placed in plain view rather than tucked away, turning a service structure into part of the look of the place.

Why it is registered

The water tower was registered nationally in 2012 with the rest of the estate, under the criterion of contributing to the historic landscape. Its value is as evidence of how a wealthy household of the period imported new technology and new style at once. Brick, sash windows, and tile banding were the vocabulary of modern building, and Matsui's villa wears them openly beside its tile-roofed halls.

What to look for

Read the building from the ground up. The white tile bands frame the brickwork like trim; the paired sash windows give each upper face a regular rhythm; the iron roof slopes one way only. Seen against the timber main house just to its south, the tower makes the estate's mix of cultures legible at a glance, the same mix that runs through the bath building and the back gate nearby.