Tsumaki Yorinaka

In this Japanese name, the surname is Tsumaki.
Tsumaki Yorinaka
Tsumaki Yorinaka
Born(1859-02-22)22 February 1859
Tokyo, Japan
Died10 October 1916(1916-10-10) (aged 57)
Tokyo, Japan
Alma materImperial College of Engineering, Cornell University
OccupationArchitect
DesignNihonbashi Bridge (1911)

Tsumaki Yorinaka (妻木 頼黄, February 22, 1859—October 10, 1916) was a Japanese architect and Head of the Japanese Ministry of Finance building section in the later Meiji period.

He was credited with the design of many significant Meiji era structures in Japan, notably the Nihonbashi Bridge.

Early life and career

Together with Katayama Tokuma, Tatsuno Kingo, Sone Tatsuzō and Satachi Shichijiro,[1] one of a group of renowned architectural students at the Imperial College of Engineering, Tokyo, and a protege of British architect Josiah Conder.

Tsumaki continued his studies in the United States where he graduated with a degree in Architecture from Cornell University in 1894.[2] He then went back to Japan, employed as a public servant at the Metropolitan Tokyo Government.

Tsumaki was appointed by the Ministry of Finance at its Temporary Office for Architecture and Buildings (TOAB) in 1888, and as the government of Japan commissioned the city planning project to the office of Wilhelm Böckmann and Hermann Ende, Tsumaki along with architects and carpenters were sent to Berlin for further study in the same field, working at the same time in the architectural offices.[3]

Yama'o Yōzō took the chair of the TOAB while Tsumaki was abroad, and announced to Böckmann's office that the zoning project would respect budget, against the blue print Böckmann had presented to the government already, or rather than how the capital and its government buildings would look, to resort to wooden structure for the first (1890–1891) and the second (1891–1925) buildings of the National Diet Hall.[4]

Tatsuno, Tsumaki's senior at the Imperial College of Engineering, was against Tsumaki's initiative and petitioned to hold an open competition for planning the Diet Hall, which Tsumaki was pushing his own plan with brick and mortar. Then, on June 8, 1912, the City of Tokyo was damaged extensively with a magnitude 6+ earthquake, and the Katsura Cabinet being overturned which had supported Tsumaki's plan, Tsumaki resigned from his office at the Ministry of Finance in 1913.[5] It was long after Tsumaki's death in 1916 when finally the National Diet building was relocated to the present address in Nagata-chō, Minato Ward, which was built with iron frames and marble in 1936.[6]

Buildings and Structures

  • Nihonbashi Bridge, shortly after opening in 1911
  • Nihonbashi Bridge, with the Shuto Expressway pictured overhead, 2007

References

  1. ^ Ōkurashō insatsu-kyoku (National Printing Office), ed. (1888-07-20). "Jonin oyobi Jirei - / - / Satachi Shichijiro hoka 1-mei (Teishin-shō)". Kampō (in Japanese) (1517). Nihon Maikuro Shashin: 194. doi:10.11501/2944755. Retrieved 2025-10-31.
  2. ^ Tsumaki, Yorinaka (1884). On the growth of Japanese architecture. search.worldcat.org (Thesis). Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University. OCLC 78535414. Retrieved 2025-10-31.
  3. ^ Checkland, Olive (2003). Japan and Britain After 1859: Creating Cultural Bridges. New York: RoutledgeCurzon. p. 82. ISBN 0-203-22183-4.
  4. ^ Shimizu, Hidenori; Ishī, Kōichirō (2019). "山尾庸三の官庁集中計画に関する研究 (Yama'o Yōjirō no kanchō shūchū keikaku ni kansuru kenyū)" [Research on Yozo Yama'o's government office zoning plan]. Journal of infrastructure planning and management D2 (History of Civil Engineering) (in Japanese). 75 (1): 32–51. doi:10.2208/jscejhsce.75.32. ISSN 1880-6058 – via www.jstage.jst.go.jp.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) Journal title Doboku Gakkai ronbunshū. D2 (Doboku-shi) (土木学会論文集d2（土木史）), available on JSTAGE in Japanese.
  5. ^ Shimizu & Ishī 2019, pp. 32–51.
  6. ^ Momose, Takashi (February 1990). Itō, Takashi (ed.). Jiten shōwa senzenki no Nihon: seido to jittai (1st ed.). Tōkyō: Yashikawa kōbunkan. p. 36. ISBN 4-642-03619-9. Title in Japanese: (事典 昭和戦前期の日本―制度と実態).
  7. ^ Botsman, Daniel (2007). Punishment and Power in the Making of Modern Japan. Princeton University Press. p. 196. ISBN 978-0-691-13030-9.
  • Media related to Tsumaki Yorinaka at Wikimedia Commons
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.