Kazama Family Former Villa Muryokoen

A Merchant Prince's House for Guests

Kazama Family Former Villa Muryokoen (風間家旧別邸無量光苑, Muryōkōen) is a guest villa built in 1910 by the Kazama merchant family in Izumimachi, Tsuruoka, Yamagata Prefecture, where six structures, the Shakado hall, three gates, a board fence and a storehouse, are listed as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties. The Shakado was registered on 14 February 2002 and the other five on 1 July 2003.

The family traced its origins to a samurai house in Echigo Province. Having turned to trade, its members moved by way of Murakami and Sakata and settled in Tsuruoka in the late eighteenth century. In 1779 the first head of the Tsuruoka line took the name Kōemon and set up on his own under the trade name Kanaya, granted by the main family in Sakata. The Kazama sold kimono silks and cotton goods as purveyors to the Shōnai domain, and by the end of the Edo period they were counted the richest merchants in town.

In the Meiji era they moved into moneylending and became the second-largest landowners in the Shōnai region, behind only the Honma family of Sakata. The lending business grew into the Kazama Bank, one of four banks merged in 1941 to form today's Shonai Bank. The family home, Heishindo, was built in 1896 by the seventh Kōemon about 50 metres to the south.

Muryokoen was not a place to live. It was where the Kazama received and entertained important visitors, and most of its 820 tsubo (about 2,700 square metres) is given over to garden.

How the Villa Got Its Name

From the day it was finished, the villa displayed a framed inscription reading Muryōkō, "immeasurable light," an epithet of Amida Buddha. It was brushed by Mokuan, one of the three great calligraphers of the Ōbaku Zen school. The Kazama were devout followers of Jōdo Shinshū, the Pure Land sect centred on Amida, and the eighth head of the family named the house and garden together Muryokoen after the plaque.

The ninth head later placed a small stone figure of Shaka, the historical Buddha, in the alcove of the main room. It had been presented by a scholar of Indian philosophy at Tokyo Imperial University, and from then on the whole property was known as Muryokoen Shakado. That is why the main building carries the name Shakado today.

The name suggests a temple, but the Shakado is a house. It was built as a set of reception rooms in the refined Sukiya-zukuri manner, and the national database classifies it simply as a residence.

Six Structures and How They Fit Together

The six carry registration numbers 06-0042 (the Shakado) and 06-0053 to 06-0057 (storehouse, front gate, middle gate, north gate and board fence). The Shakado, the storehouse and the north gate were registered as models of design; the front gate, the middle gate and the fence for their contribution to the historic townscape.

The front gate, a Yakuimon, opens at the east end of the south side. The Shakado stands in the middle of the lot with its entrance facing west, and beside that entrance the middle gate screens off the inner garden. Broad verandas under deep Tsuchibisashi eaves wrap the east and north sides of the rooms. Along the street on the west runs the board fence, 62 metres long. In the northwest corner the north gate stands a little back from the old moat that marks the north boundary, and in the southeast corner is the storehouse.

The dates spread across several decades. The Shakado dates from 1910, and the front gate, middle gate and fence are thought to be of about the same age. The north gate is placed in the early Meiji period, older than the villa itself. The storehouse was built around 1897 as the inner store of the family home across the road and moved here in 1955; the fence was relocated in 1954.

Three gates may seem generous for one villa. Seen together they explain the house: a formal front gate for arriving guests, a tea-garden gate by the tearoom, and a plain, sturdy gate guarding the back.

The Garden Through the Year

The garden was planted to be viewed from the rooms. The Kokunensha foundation, which runs the villa, says some of its cherries are over 200 years old, and in April Somei-yoshino, mountain cherry and weeping cherry come into flower in turn. May belongs to the azaleas; the prefectural tourism association picks mid-May, when the white azaleas open all at once, as the peak of the year.

In autumn the maples and bush clover turn, and the Chinese quince, treated as one of the garden's emblems, bears fruit. Dozens of flowering plants take their turn through the season.

Sit on the veranda of the Shakado and the low eaves crop the view into a long horizontal frame. It is a composed picture, arranged for guests, and the villa makes most sense when house and garden are taken in together.

Visiting

Kazama Family Former Villa Muryokoen is open from 15 April to 30 November, 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (last entry 4:00 p.m.), on a joint ticket with Heishindo. The official Japanese site lists adult admission at 500 yen, with junior high school students and younger free. It closes on 13 July for Obon, and in 2026 it also closed on 4 July for an event. From December to mid-April it is shut.

Published prices vary. The prefectural tourism site still shows an older adult fare of 400 yen, and the English page of the official site gives a child fare of 200 yen, so check the Japanese official page before you go. Transit IC cards and QR-code payments are accepted.

From JR Tsuruoka Station on the Uetsu Line, take a bus bound for Yunohama Onsen and get off after about 10 minutes at Shiyakusho-mae (City Hall), then walk about 5 minutes. By car it is about 10 minutes from the Tsuruoka interchange on the Yamagata Expressway, or about 15 minutes from Tsuruoka-Nishi on the Nihonkai-Tohoku Expressway. Parking is on the west side of Heishindo, in front of the Tsuruoka No. 2 Joint Government Building.

Heishindo sits just across the road to the south. Seeing the family home and the guest villa on the same ticket shows clearly how one household divided daily life from hospitality. Enquiries go to Muryokoen Shakado on 0235-22-1112.