Nagoya Touken World

Nagoya Touken World is a museum of Japanese swords, samurai armor and ukiyo-e in Nagoya, also called the Nagoya Touken Museum (名古屋刀剣博物館) or Meihaku for short. It opened in May 2024. The Touken World Foundation runs it, and Token Corporation founded it as part of its social contribution work, to keep valuable works of Japanese craft and art together and to bring more visitors to Nagoya.

The collection

About 500 swords make up the core of the collection, from blades of the late Heian period to the work of living smiths. All five classic traditions of Japanese swordmaking, the Gokaden (五箇伝), are represented: Yamato, Yamashiro, Bizen, Sagami and Mino. Up to 200 swords can be on show at a time, with about 50 suits of armor, 150 ukiyo-e prints and 350 matchlocks and early Western firearms. The museum also holds sword fittings, horse gear and paintings. Its ukiyo-e are mostly battle scenes and portraits of warriors.

National Treasures, Important Cultural Properties and Important Art Objects are among the pieces on display. One National Treasure is the Uraku Rai Kunimitsu, a tanto, or short sword, made by Rai Kunimitsu of the Yamashiro tradition. It is said to have belonged to Oda Uraku, the youngest brother of Oda Nobunaga and a master of the tea ceremony.

The building

The museum fills a seven-storey North Building and the first three floors of the main building of Sakae Tower Hills, a 28-storey tower built to a concept by the architect Kisho Kurokawa. The front of the North Building is modelled on a kido-mon (木戸門), the wooden gate of a traditional Japanese house. Its round windows and ring-shaped roof ornaments repeat those of the tower.

Inside, the colors are the blue, red and gold of armor and sword fittings, with metallic tones taken from the blades. Coffered ceilings painted with flowers, phoenixes and celestial maidens grow more elaborate on each floor up, and carved ranma (欄間), openwork transom panels, are set into the walls.

Floors

The ground floor has the museum shop and the reception, along with cannons and large-bore guns from the Sengoku to the Edo period. On the second floor, the permanent gallery shows Important Art Objects and swords graded Tokubetsu Juyo Token (特別重要刀剣), Special Important Swords. The armor zone, a film theater and the Japanese cafe and restaurant Yuraku share the same floor.

Themed displays of the museum's own swords take up part of the third floor. Beside them are an ukiyo-e zone, a zone of bows and guns, a library, and gold statues of the Sanketsu (三傑), the three warlords Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu. The special exhibition room on the fourth floor holds temporary exhibitions and pieces such as National Treasures and Important Cultural Properties. Ukiyo-e line the stairs from the second floor to the fourth. On the sixth floor, a tatami room serves as a study room and tea room for sword viewings, tea gatherings and lectures.