Meiji Mura and the Imperial Hotel

250 acres of beautiful, rolling hillside by Lake Iruka in Nagoya, dotted with late 19th and early 20th century buildings. That is Meiji Mura. 

The concept of a park, an open air museum, to house reconstructed buildings that had to make way for modern development, was brought up by architect Taniguchi Yoshiyo. He started Meiji Mura with his college classmate, Tsuchikawa Moto, with funding from Nagoya Railroad. The story has it that the sight of the demolition of a Meiji era building, Rokumein, prompted Yoshiyo to start Meiji Mura. 

Over 60 historical buildings have been reconstructed here - most from the Meiji period, when Japan had opened its doors, and western influence was seeping into its architecture. 

The reconstruction we were there to see was the main entrance and lobby of the Imperial Hotel, the famous Frank Lloyd Wright creation that was one of the few buildings to withstand a devastating earthquake, but had to finally make way for its bigger, modern counterpart. It had come to rest in Meiji Mura, a mute testament to the skills of a master designer. The natural stone and brick reconstruction displayed the high degree of detailing and craft that went into Wright's work. 

A replanted building is often nothing more than a souless shell. Torn out of its context and setting. Propped up elsewhere, forced to stand, a mere display. Questions of development, conservation and reuse ping-ponged about the mind. It was better, was the final thought, all considered, to have seen a small portion of a master work in this form than not at all. Painfully reconstructed, stone by stone, brought to [a shell of] its former glory. It helped to think of the park as a Museum. A visual link to the past. Museums too after all, are in many ways, mausoleums. But they serve a purpose.  

Both happily and sadly, Meiji Mura was my first experience of Frank Lloyd Wright's [an all time favourite architect's] work. As far as the 'Wright' expectations were concerned, they were met fully. Every wall, every corner, every ledge, every window was a perfect composition in itself, and all elements came together to create spaces of 'Wright' proportions and compositional complexity. A master work stands tall on its own, even if as a shell.