Tōkasai-kan, Chinese restaurant in Shimogyō ward, Kyoto, Japan
Tōkasai-kan is a Chinese restaurant housed in a building that showcases Spanish Baroque architecture, featuring ornate facade details, traditional wooden window frames, and stone accents. The structure spans multiple floors and accommodates around 400 diners across different seating areas, from open dining spaces to private rooms for smaller groups.
The building was completed in 1926 for the Western-style restaurant Yao-masa, which had opened as an oyster restaurant around 1892 and added Western cuisine around 1907. Designed by the Vories architectural office, it became the Chinese restaurant Tōkasai-kan in 1945. A 2016 fire damaged part of the basement transformer room.
The building is a Registered Tangible Cultural Property of Japan. The restaurant opened in 1945 in a 1926 structure built for the oyster restaurant Yao-masa, which had served Western food from around 1907. The name Tōkasai-kan refers to Chinese cuisine, and the large characters on the facade mark the entrance above the Kamo River.
The main branch stands at the south end of the west approach to Shijō Ōhashi bridge, on the banks of the Kamo River in Shimogyō ward; the nearest station is Kyoto Kawaramachi, not a station of that name. The building has a basement and several upper floors, and the elevator is staffed and manually operated, so allow time for it.
The elevator was made by Otis in 1924, before the 1926 building was finished, and is operated by staff. It has two doors set at a right angle, so passengers enter and leave on different sides. Together with elevators in two Kobe buildings, it ranks among the oldest surviving in Japan.
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