Hayakawa Residence

Dori is a fishing port located at the eastern end of Aomi Island, and was a strategic point of San-in maritime traffic where a seaway barrier was established in the Middle Ages, and prospered as a base for Choshu whaling in the Edo period. The Hayakawa family contributed to the founding of the Kayoi Kujira-gumi during the Edo period, and the family was active as a net-head and urakata official for many generations. The house used to belong to the Kurokawa family, who also ran a shipping business, and it is said that the Hayakawa family bought the house after it was burned down in the Great Tsunoura Fire of 1785, and moved in. The house is thought to have been built in the latter half of the 18th century based on its style. It is a two-story, partly storehouse-style house with a gabled roof on the south side and a gabled roof on the north side. It has a beam length of 3.5 ken, a short eave in the front, and a two-story pitched roof in the back. The house is similar to a machiya (townhouse) in plan, with a girder length of just under 7 ken, and a two-story earthen floor on the north side, with three rooms in each of two rows arranged vertically above the upper floor. The upper part of the upper floor has two rows of three rooms each arranged vertically. The earthen floor is covered with four thick ox-beams, and a Japanese hut is built on top of the beams. The upper three rooms are covered with long split-leaf screens, and the Oku-zashiki room has a floor and a separate shelf. Next to the Oku-zashiki is a one-ken butsumae (Buddhist room) with a built-in butsudan (Buddhist altar) in the upper part. The design is bold and has an atmosphere befitting a fisherman's residence. It has been relatively well preserved and is one of the few valuable structures of its kind in Japan.