Ichijima Gun Shop and Residence

About the Ichijima Gun Shop and Residence

The Ichijima Gun Shop and Residence (市島銃砲火薬店・市島家住宅) is the property of the Ichijima family, gunpowder merchants since the Edo period, at Nanokamachi, Yamagata City, Yamagata Prefecture, whose reinforced-concrete shop of 1927 and earthen storehouse of 1910 were registered as two Registered Tangible Cultural Property structures on November 20, 2001 (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

Yamagata Prefecture lists the owner as a private individual and the buildings as not open to the public.

Two Structures

The two-storey concrete shop faces the street, with the shop on the ground floor and a tatami room above. Its washed-mortar walls with joint lines, pilasters and capitals imitate stone, and it is said to be the first reinforced-concrete shop in Yamagata (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

The storehouse behind is a gabled two-storey earthen building dated to 1910 by a ridge tag, with a sukiya-style tatami room below and a store above, thick plastered walls, beam mouldings and double doors (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

A Merchant Property in Nanokamachi

A modern shop on the street and a traditional storehouse at the back together show how a Yamagata merchant property was arranged from the Meiji to early Showa periods. Yamagata Prefecture calls the shop small but solid, and the storehouse a two-storey plastered store at the back of the site.

Visiting and Location

The address is 5-10-53 Nanokamachi, Yamagata City. Neither building is open to the public, so please view the shop front from the street only (Yamagata Prefecture).