The Townscape of Takayama

Takayama's well-preserved old town is almost entirely made up of machiya, the merchant and artisan townhouses built during the Edo period. The city grew around a castle established by Kanamori Nagachika in 1586, positioned at the crossing of five major roads that brought commercial prosperity. When the Tokugawa shogunate took direct control in 1695 and the Kanamori lords departed, Takayama became a city shaped by trade and craft rather than samurai governance. Fires swept through the wooden blocks repeatedly between 1729 and 1832, and wealthy families built earthen-walled storehouses to protect valuables. The fireproof kura storehouses and restored merchant streets remain the town's defining feature today.