Kawagoe, Kawagoe

Kawagoe, Kawagoe is a merchant town in the center of the former castle town in Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture. It was selected as an Important Preservation District for Groups of Traditional Buildings on 1 December 1999 and covers about 7.8 hectares. According to Kawagoe City's material, today's townscape consists of traditional buildings in a variety of styles, beginning with the black-plastered kurazukuri (storehouse-style) merchant houses built after the Great Kawagoe Fire of 1893 (Meiji 26) and including modern Western-style buildings. It is worth noting first that this is not a townscape of kurazukuri alone.

According to Kawagoe City, the roots of the present town go back to 1457 (Choroku 1), when Ota Doshin and his son Ota Dokan built Kawagoe Castle as the residence of the Ogigayatsu Uesugi clan. It was developed as an early modern castle town in the early Edo period and thereafter prospered as a commercial city as river transport and highways were developed. Matsudaira Nobutsuna, who became lord the year after the fire of 1638 (Kan'ei 15), laid out the town anew as part of the recovery. Sources differ on the date of the layout that survives: the National Council of Traditional Building Preservation Districts says it largely follows the form of the Kan'ei era (1624-1643), while a Kawagoe City document published by the Agency for Cultural Affairs says the form fixed in the Keian era (1648-1652) was followed until the end of the Edo period. The preservation district corresponds to the center of the townspeople's quarter in that layout. The streets were planned with T-junctions and hook-shaped turns as well as crossroads, and this pattern remains clearly visible today.

The main attraction among the buildings is the kurazukuri merchant houses rebuilt after the fire of 1893. Kurazukuri with fire-resistant black plaster exterior walls became the lead element of this landscape. The National Council of Traditional Building Preservation Districts likewise says that kurazukuri merchant houses with black plaster walls, built after the fire, are the stars of the scene. Beyond the black of the walls, look at the height of the roofs and how the ridges stand out. The local town-planning code does not fix a uniform height; it offers suggestions such as "decide height by looking at the surroundings" and "let the principal ridges and buildings stand out." The mixture of modern Western-style buildings also shows the depth of layers that the commercial city built up from the Meiji period on.

In the history of preservation, in fiscal 1981 the city began designating kurazukuri merchant houses as city cultural properties. In fiscal 1987 the Machinami Iinkai (Townscape Committee) was founded on Ichibangai. Composed of shopping-street members, researchers, specialists and the government, it aims at both commercial revitalization and conservation of the townscape. It set the Machizukuri Kihan (town-planning code) and has also consulted and advised on individual building projects. The code's basic goals are revitalizing commercial activity, a living environment suited to modern times, and preserving and handing down the historic townscape. The burying of Ichibangai's utility lines was completed in fiscal 1992, a preservation ordinance followed in fiscal 1998, and national selection in fiscal 1999. From fiscal 2000 to 2025, 100 repairs and 5 facade restorations were carried out.

The City's material also gives clues for combining it with its surroundings. The Toki no Kane bell tower underwent seismic reinforcement from fiscal 2013 to 2016, showing that preservation extends beyond buildings to the town's symbols. The Kawagoe Hikawa Festival float event, an Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property, was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2016, and the city also subsidizes float repairs. Visitor numbers for Kawagoe City reached 7.75 million in 2019. For the kurazukuri merchant houses, look at the walls and eaves at quieter times of day, when the details of the construction are easier to see.