Visiting the Hommaru Palace at Nagoya Castle is a study in traditional craftsmanship. In some rooms, vivid seasonal motifs are painted on gold leaf-coated sliding doors; intricately carved cranes seem to fly out of striking red, green and gold reliefs. Look up and there are ceilings decorated with black lacquer, while others have geometric patterns in understated, natural woods. Sometimes, you notice the almost sweet-sage scent of the cypress framework and the straw-like aroma of the tatami flooring.
Originally built on the orders of first Edo-era shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu at the same time as Nagoya Castle between 1610 and 1615, the Hommaru Palace was used as the administrative office and residence of the feudal lord of Owari—part of the wider Tokugawa family. And although the Hommaru Palace and large parts of Nagoya Castle were destroyed by air raids during the end of World War Two, a reconstruction project that finished in 2018 has seen the Hommaru Palace brought back to life with incredible detail and skill by modern-day artisans using traditional crafting and materials.
Walk through the Hommaru Palace ’s 30 or so rooms with one of Nagoya Castle’s volunteer guides and you don’t just learn about the crafting, you get a lesson in court etiquette and status in feudal Japan. Visitors would have been welcomed at a thatched entrance, then led by rooms decorated with menacing images of tigers—a reminder perhaps not to step out of line. As they then went further into the building each room would—as they do now—become progressively more impressive, signaling the elevated rank of those permitted to enter them with higher and more decorative ceilings, more ornate fittings and finishes and more elaborate art. Combined with the castle, the Hommaru Palace was a statement of Tokugawa wealth, power and refinement—during 260 years of Tokugawa rule, nobody dared attack it.
Following the Kiso Hinoki to Inuyama
The majority of both the original and new Hommaru Palace was built with a type of cypress called Kiso hinoki, a variety from the Kiso region, north of Nagoya in what is now Nagano Prefecture. It is regarded as one of the finest woods in Japan—because of its aroma, colour, sturdiness and even antibacterial qualities—and from palaces to the Grand Shrine at Ise, which for the last 1,300 years has been rebuilt every 20 years in accordance with Shinto tradition, Kiso hinoki has been the wood of choice. If you retrace the route the Kiso hinoki took on its way to Nagoya, you realize just how influential the wood was on the region.
It would have come into Nagoya from the castle town of Inuyama 30 kilometers to the north—now just 30 minutes from Nagoya on the Meitetsu Line—where there is still an area of town called Zaimoku-cho (Lumber district).
The best way to get a sense of Inuyama is from the balcony that wraps around the top floor of its castle—one of the 12 original castles in Japan that remain largely as they were when first built. In one direction, you’ll see the wide Kiso River—aka Japan’s Rhine—most famously today the site of the ukai (cormorant fishing) that takes place between June and mid-October. Lumber is no longer transported along the river, but in the Edo era the Kisogawa was used to float Kiso hinoki and other wood from upstream in the Kiso Valley down to Inuyama, where it was taxed and traded.
Look south from the balcony and you see the old part of town (now a mix of old and modern) that developed outward from the castle. It’s a great view, but it’s even better to see the area on foot, on the way stopping off at the Sanko Inari Shrine—where you could leave a wish for romance or a good relationship on a heart-shaped votive plaque or wash your money in the hope it will be doubled—and then dropping by the Inuyama Cultural Assets Museum to see a diorama of how the town would have been in the Edo era.
Beyond that, the old town is just a nice place to stroll for an hour or two, exploring craft shops and cafes, or learning about Inuyama’s annual festival at the Dondenkan museum. Started in 1635 and now held the first weekend of April, the Inuyama Matsuri features a parade of multi-tiered eight-meter-high floats—some covered in black lacquer, others decorated with hundreds of paper lanterns—in a lively throwback to when the Kiso hinoki trade was at its peak.
More Information
For more about Inuyama, visit the Inuyama Tourism Association - click here
For more about Nagoya Castle - click here
To find out about transportation in the region - click here
For information on traveling to Nagoya and other parts of central Japan from Osaka and Tokyo - click here