An old trading house in Fujimino

We have recently visited this old trading house, build some 120 years ago in Fujimino city (Saitama prefecture). Its official name is The Fukuoka Riverside Museum, Fukuoka being the name of the area in Fujimino city, and riverside simply because the house was built along the Shingashi river.

This river was central to the house’s trading function. Boats sailed from and to Tokyo, stopped there with goods to trade. The house itself is really worth a visit, for a few very good reasons. First because it has been very well preserved; second because you can go almost everywhere inside, and even climb the very steep stairs to the upper floors. No elevators were added, no modern safer and more convenient stairs were built as it is sometimes the case… the house is 100% authentic.

And third because this house also has a few architectural particularities making it really unique. For instance it has a three floors little tower, with one reception room on each floor. And it also uses a lot of decorated glass panels in its shoji screens, those traditional sliding doors made of paper and wood put front of the windows. Here, the owner had lots of glass panels embedded in these paper structures, resulting in a fascinating fusion between Europe’s early 20th century Art Deco flavours and the traditional Japanese style.