Kanazawa’s Higashi Chaya District Preserves Traditional Look | : Japan in Video

Kanazawa’s Higashi Chaya-gai (literally “Eastern Teahouse District”) was established as an entertainment quarter in 1820 with the authorization of the feudal lord of the Kaga domain. Kanazawa was then thriving as the capital of this top-ranking domain, and the district preserves the look of those times. The streets are lined with two-story wooden townhouses featuring distinctive “kimusuko” wooden screens that allow those inside to look out but conceal the interior from those on the street. The government ha