Retro Japan: Elaborate music hall in Yamaguchi Prefecture. “Groundbreaking work” by the famous architect

UBE, Yamaguchi – An elaborately designed music hall in this western Japanese city to commemorate a local industrialist is being called a “groundbreaking work” by renowned architect Togo Murano.

The Watanabe Memorial Hall, designed by Murano (1891-1984), was built to commemorate the achievements of Sukesaku Watanabe (1864-1934), who contributed to the development of the city of Ube by establishing the Okinoyama coal mine, the predecessor of the chemical and engineering company Ube Corp., as well as schools and a hospital. The building's construction was supported by donations from companies associated with Watanabe, and was completed in 1937 as a music hall.

The first floor lobby resembles a forest of milky-white marble columns reminiscent of an underwater coal mining tunnel, while the second floor lobby is a beautiful space with brownish-red stone columns and a checkered floor. The lighting and decoration throughout the building are based on the motif of an eagle. The design is said to have been inspired by Germany, which had an anti-communist agreement with Japan at the time.

Inside the music hall, gently overlapping curves create a sense of dignity. The hall was designed with the advice of an acoustic expert and has a reverberation time of 1.9 seconds, which is close to the ideal value for a music hall of 2 seconds.

The complex, which Murano described as his “groundbreaking work,” was declared a national treasure in 2005.

(Japanese original by Minoru Kanazawa, Kyushu Photo and Video Department)

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The Japanese version of this article was originally published on October 24, 2021.

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