Yodokō Guest House, Historic residence in Yamatechō, Ashiya, Japan
The Yodokō Guest House is a historic residence in Yamatechō, Ashiya, Japan, built from reinforced concrete in four tiered floors on a hillside. The structure uses the slope to create views across the surrounding landscape from its elevated position.
Designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1918, the villa was built by his disciples Arata Endo and Shin Minami and completed in 1924 for Tazaemon Yamamura, eighth head of the Sakura-Masamune sake brewery in Nada. Wright had already returned to the United States, so Endo supervised the work. It is the only nearly complete Wright residence surviving in Japan.
The name comes from Yodogawa Steel Works, which acquired the property later and preserves it to this day. Visitors see dark mahogany wood alongside the greenish Ōya stone inside, creating warm and cool tones together in the rooms.
The house stands in Yamatechō, Ashiya: ten minutes on foot from Hankyū Ashiyagawa Station, fifteen from JR Ashiya and twenty from Hanshin Ashiya; Hankyū buses stop at Kaimoribashi, five minutes away. It reopened on 16 February 2019 after preservation work. Because the four levels step into the steep hill, visitors move between floors by stairs.
The house was damaged in the 1995 Great Hanshin earthquake and later repaired before reopening. Its decorative blocks are of Ōya stone from Tochigi Prefecture, not concrete, echoing Wright's Los Angeles textile-block houses. The four levels are stepped into the hill so that none rises more than two stories.
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