As I was walking around Nihonbashi, one of the oldest commercial district of central Tokyo, I came to find this small shirt-making shop called “Eirakuya”.
Impressively aged in one of the most busiest district, I did a little digging into its background.
According to some internet information, the building was built in 1925.
It was built after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, and during World War II, fires caused by air raids reached the opposite bank of the nearby Nihonbashi River, but the wind changed its direction and the building barely escaped the disaster.
So here’s the latest addition to #TokyoUlyssesProject (TUP).
The area is more officially known Nihonbashi-Kakigaracho where since the Edo period, soy sauce and kitchenware wholesalers widely operated in this area and there are still head offices of related companies even to this day.
In this area of Nihonbashi is called, Kakigaracho, a literal translation will be “town of oyster shells”.
According to the official HP of Chuo City Ward Office in charge of Nihonbashi area, the origin of the town’s name is not clear, although it is said to have once been a drying area for fishermen’s small nets and a beach where oyster shells were deposited.
Unknown origin is also very intrigueing.
EIRAKUYA SHIRT LTD. IN NIHONBASHI (Kakigaracho)
A shirt making company, building built in 1925, Nihonbashi-Kakigaracho, Chuo-City, Tokyo.
Tokyo Ulysses Project no. 002-0010
#fabiocaipirinha #tokyoulyssesproject #nihonbashi #kakigaracho #tokyotourism #tokyoarchitecture
