Shofuso (Pine Breeze Villa), ( ja, 松風荘) also known as Japanese House and Garden, is a traditional 17th century-style Japanese house and
garden
A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the cultivation, display, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature. The single feature identifying even the wildest wild garden is ''control''. The garden can incorporate both ...
located in Philadelphia's West
Fairmount Park
Fairmount Park is the largest municipal park in Philadelphia and the historic name for a group of parks located throughout the city. Fairmount Park consists of two park sections named East Park and West Park, divided by the Schuylkill River, with ...
on the site of the
Centennial Exposition
The Centennial International Exhibition of 1876, the first official World's Fair to be held in the United States, was held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from May 10 to November 10, 1876, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the signing of the ...
of 1876. Shofuso is a nonprofit historic site with over 30,000 visitors each year and is open to the public for visitation and group tours.
Shofuso was built in 1953 as a gift from Japan to American citizens, to symbolize post-war peace and friendship between the two countries. The building was constructed using traditional Japanese techniques and materials imported from Japan, and was originally exhibited in the courtyard of the
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
(MoMA) in New York. After two years, it was relocated to Philadelphia and reconstructed in 1958. In 1976, a major restoration was conducted by a cadre of Japanese artisans in preparation for the American Bicentennial celebration. In 2007, contemporary
Nihonga
''Nihonga'' (, "Japanese-style paintings") are Japanese paintings from about 1900 onwards that have been made in accordance with traditional Japanese artistic conventions, techniques and materials. While based on traditions over a thousand years ...
artist
Hiroshi Senju
is a Japanese ''Nihonga'' painter known for his large scale waterfall paintings.
Biography
Hiroshi Senju was born in Tokyo. He has one brother, composer Akira Senju, and one sister, violinist Mariko Senjyu. He completed the BFA, Tokyo Univer ...
created and donated an interior installation of twenty waterfall murals.
Shofuso is owned by the city of
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
and is administered, maintained, preserved, and operated by the
Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia
The Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia (JASGP) is a private nonprofit and nonpartisan organization that promotes arts, business, and cultural exchange between the United States and Japan in the Greater Philadelphia region. The organi ...
, a private
nonprofit
A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...
.
Background
MoMA initiated their series of "House in the Garden" exhibitions in the courtyard of the Museum in 1949. Architectural director
Philip Johnson
Philip Cortelyou Johnson (July 8, 1906 – January 25, 2005) was an American architect best known for his works of modern and postmodern architecture. Among his best-known designs are his modernist Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut; the pos ...
and curator
Arthur Drexler
Arthur Justin Drexler (13 March 1925 – 16 January 1987) was a museum curator and director of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) for 35 years.
Life
Drexler was born in Brooklyn and attended the High School of Music and Art, and The Cooper Union st ...
recognized the correspondence between
modernism
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
in the Western house and traditional Japanese architecture and proposed to build a Japanese house as the third exhibit of the series.
John D. Rockefeller III
John Davison Rockefeller III (March 21, 1906 – July 10, 1978) was an American philanthropist. Rockefeller was the eldest son and second child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller as well as a grandson of Standard Oil co-found ...
, then-president of the
Japan Society (New York)
Japan Society is a non-profit organization formed in 1907 to promote friendly relations between the United States and Japan. Its headquarters was designed by Junzo Yoshimura and opened in 1971 at 333 East 47th Street near the United Nations. Wit ...
, and MoMA curator Arthur Drexler visited Japan in February 1953 to meet with the business leaders of Japan and to request their support for the project. The Japan-America Society (JAS) agreed to sponsor the project, and declared that the Japanese House should be donated by Japan as a gift to American people in order to promote the cultural exchange. Sponsored by both the private sector and the government, the JAS raised a total of ¥18.5 million ($51,000 at the exchange rate of ¥360/$ in 1953) from 270 corporations and individuals. The National Forestry Agency of Japan granted special permission to harvest the wood, particularly "hinoki" cypress wood, which was in short supply.
A special Rockefeller Architectural Committee was formed and recommended a 17th-century house for the exhibit since that style most typically represents Japanese traditional architecture. The Committee unanimously chose Junzo Yoshimura to design the house. Yoshimura had worked for Czech-born American modernist architect,
Antonin Raymond
Antonin Raymond (or cs, Antonín Raymond), born as Antonín Reimann (10 May 1888 – 25 October 1976)"Deaths Elsewhere", ''Miami Herald'', 30 October 1976, p. 10 was a Czech American architect. Raymond was born and studied in Bohemia (now part ...
for nine years in Tokyo and spent in 1940 a year in Raymond's office in
New Hope, Pennsylvania
New Hope is a borough (Pennsylvania), borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The population was 2,612 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. New Hope is located approximately north of Philadelphia, and lies on the west bank of the Delaw ...
. Yoshimura was close friends with
George Nakashima
George Katsutoshi Nakashima ( ja, 中島勝寿 ''Nakashima Katsutoshi'', May 24, 1905 – June 15, 1990) was an American woodworker, architect, and furniture maker who was one of the leading innovators of 20th century furniture design and a fathe ...
, a Japanese American furniture maker in
Bucks County, Pennsylvania
Bucks County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 646,538, making it the fourth-most populous county in Pennsylvania. Its county seat is Doylestown. The county is named after the Englis ...
. The 11th generation master carpenter, Heizaemon Ito was chosen to oversee the construction. Ito's family has been master carpenter of Lord Tokugawa, the shogunate family that ruled Japan throughout the Edo period (1600-1868), since the 17th century.
Exhibit at MoMA
Pre-assembly of the house began in January 1953 at Ito's workshop in Nagoya, and was completed a year later, using the traditional Japanese method of building, which minimizes the use of structural nails, employing various joineries through the use of hand tools. The house was then disassembled and shipped to New York. The reassembly team led by architect Yoshimura arrived at New York in March, 1954 and completed the construction mid-June with help of a cadre of Hawaiian Nisei carpenters. The inaugural ceremony was held on June 17, 1954, and Shofuso was opened to the public on June 19. Japanese prime minister
Shigeru Yoshida
(22 September 1878 – 20 October 1967) was a Japanese diplomat and politician who served as prime minister of Japan from 1946 to 1947 and from 1948 to 1954. Yoshida was one of the longest-serving Japanese prime ministers, and is the third-long ...
visited Shofuso in November 1954, escorted by John D. and Blanchette Rockefeller. The American public was impressed with the beauty of natural wood, simple interior design, and the house's flexible plan. The exhibit was closed on October 16, 1955, after attracting almost a quarter of million visitors in two seasons, approximately three times as many visitors as the two previous MoMA House and Garden exhibits (a 1949 house by architect
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer ( ; 21 May 1902 – 1 July 1981), was a Hungarian-born modernist architect and furniture designer.
At the Bauhaus he designed the Wassily Chair and the Cesca Chair, which ''The New York Times'' have called some of the most im ...
that exists today at
Kykuit
Kykuit ( ), known also as the John D. Rockefeller Estate, is a 40-room historic house museum in Pocantico Hills, a hamlet in the town of Mount Pleasant, New York 25 miles north of New York City. The house was built for oil tycoon and Rockefelle ...
, the Rockefeller family estate in Pocantico Hills, New York, and a 1950 house by architect
Gregory Ain
Gregory Samuel Ain (March 28, 1908 – January 9, 1988) was an American architect active in the mid-20th century. Working primarily in the Los Angeles area, Ain is best known for bringing elements of modern architecture to lower- and medium- ...
), demolished after the exhibition.
Nio-Mon Temple Gate
Nio-Mon Temple Gate was a c.1600 Japanese building from
Hitachi Province
was an old provinces of Japan, old province of Japan in the area of Ibaraki Prefecture.Louis Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Hitachi fudoki''" in . It was sometimes called . Hitachi Province bordered on Shimōsa Province, S ...
first exhibited at the
1904 World's Fair
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition, informally known as the St. Louis World's Fair, was an World's fair, international exposition held in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, from April 30 to December 1, 1904. Local, state, and federal funds tota ...
in
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi River, Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the Greater St. Louis, ...
. Following the fair, it was purchased and relocated to Fairmount Park. Also known as the "Japanese Pagoda", the area surrounding it was landscaped with a Japanese garden and lotus pond in 1909, funded by John T. Morris. A fire completely destroyed the Temple Gate on the evening of May 6, 1955, and thereby, as fate would have it, creating an ideal site for Shofuso.
Relocation to Philadelphia
MoMA received a number of inquiries on the possibility of permanent exhibition of Shofuso. The final decision was to offer Shofuso as a gift to the Fairmount Park Commission in Philadelphia, a decision likely inspired by the presence of the Japanese garden in the park. In 1958, the carpenter, Okumura, and the gardener, Sano, who had built Shofuso at MoMA, returned from Japan to reconstruct Shofuso on the new site. The present setting of Shofuso was opened to the public on October 19, 1958.
Over the years, Shofuso fell into disrepair due to lack of maintenance. In 1975, Philadelphia Mayor
Frank Rizzo
Francis Lazarro Rizzo (October 23, 1920 – July 16, 1991) was an American police officer and politician. He served as Philadelphia police commissioner from 1968 to 1971 and mayor of Philadelphia from 1972 to 1980. He was a member of the Democr ...
contacted the Consulate General of Japan in New York to inquire about the possibility restoring Shofuso for the 1976 Bicentennial Celebration. The Japan-America Society raised ¥55 million ($180 thousand at the exchange rate of ¥308/$) to fund a complete major restoration of the house and garden in June 1976. In order to continue preservation and maintenance of Shofuso, a non-profit organization, the Friends of the Japanese House & Garden was incorporated in February 1982. The nonprofit administered Shofuso from 1982 to 2016, when it merged with the
Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia
The Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia (JASGP) is a private nonprofit and nonpartisan organization that promotes arts, business, and cultural exchange between the United States and Japan in the Greater Philadelphia region. The organi ...
The alcove and sliding doors of Shofuso at MoMA were decorated with murals painted in black ink by
Kaii Higashiyama
was a Japanese writer and artist particularly renowned for his Nihonga style paintings. As one of the most popular artists in post-war Japan, Higashiyama was awarded the Japan Art Academy Prize in 1956 and the Order of Culture in 1969.
Biograph ...
. All were destroyed by vandalism. In 2003, the internationally acclaimed Japanese painter,
Hiroshi Senju
is a Japanese ''Nihonga'' painter known for his large scale waterfall paintings.
Biography
Hiroshi Senju was born in Tokyo. He has one brother, composer Akira Senju, and one sister, violinist Mariko Senjyu. He completed the BFA, Tokyo Univer ...
offered to donate twenty murals to Shofuso. Senju's murals depict waterfalls in a custom "Shofuso color" created by blending colors extracted from the elements in the house and garden. The paintings were rendered on
mulberry paper
The paper mulberry (''Broussonetia papyrifera'', synonym (taxonomy), syn. ''Morus papyrifera'' L.) is a species of flowering plant in the family Moraceae. It is native to Asia,John F. Street issued a proclamation naming April 27 "Senju Day".
Architecture
Shofuso was modeled after the guest house of Kojo-in, a sub-temple of
Mii-dera
, formally called , is a Buddhist temple in Japan located at the foot of Mount Hiei, in the city of Ōtsu in Shiga Prefecture. It is a short distance from both Kyoto, and Lake Biwa, Japan's largest lake. The head temple of the Jimon sect ...
in the city of
Ōtsu
file:Otsu City Hall.JPG, 270px, Ōtsu City Hall
is the capital Cities of Japan, city of Shiga Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 343,991 in 153458 households and a population density of 740 persons per km². The total a ...
, built in 1601. The guest house at Kojo-in had all the four major components of architecture; (1) attached desk, (2) staggered shelf, (3) toko-no-ma alcove, and (4) chodai-gamae (built-in ornamental doorway). It was built following set of standards that determined the proportions of each element of the building. Following these guidelines, carpenters and builders could achieve an overall architectural harmony. Architect Yoshimura modified the design of Kojo-in to fit in the courtyard of MoMA and added a kitchen, bath and tea house to create a functional house. He created neither a replica of Kojo-in, nor an original building but a design that would help the American public understand Japanese traditional architecture. The tea house was modeled after the famous tea house "Masu-doko-no-seki" in Juko-in, subtemple of
Daitoku-ji
is a Buddhist temple, one of fourteen autonomous branches of the Rinzai school of Japanese Zen. It is located in Kita-ku, Kyoto, Japan. The "mountain name" ('' sangō'') by which it is known is . The Daitoku-ji temple complex today covers more ...
temple in Kyoto.
Garden
Shofuso's garden at MoMA was designed by Tansai Sano, a landscape architect in
Kyoto
Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...
whose family had been caretakers of the famous dry garden in Ryoan-ji temple for six generations. Eighty main stones were shipped from the old temple, which was located in central Japan. The original garden at
Fairmount Park
Fairmount Park is the largest municipal park in Philadelphia and the historic name for a group of parks located throughout the city. Fairmount Park consists of two park sections named East Park and West Park, divided by the Schuylkill River, with ...
was built by Y. Muto for the temple gate in 1909. Muto also built the Water and Hill Garden and Hill-Cloud Garden at
Morris Arboretum
The Morris Arboretum of the University of Pennsylvania (37 ha / 92 acres) is the official arboretum of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Arboretum is open daily except for major holidays. It is located at 100 East Northwestern Avenue, Chestnut ...
in Philadelphia and the Japanese garden at
Maymont
Maymont is a 100-acre (0.156 sq mi) Victorian estate and public park in Richmond, Virginia. It contains Maymont Mansion, now a historic house museum, an arboretum, formal gardens, a carriage collection, native wildlife exhibits, a nature cente ...
in Richmond, Virginia. During the 1957 installation of his new garden designed to accommodate Shofuso after its move from New York, Tansai Sano modified the design by installing a waterfall and adding new planting scheme. In 1976, at the time of major restoration, Ken Nakajima further modified it installing the berm. The ''Journal of Japanese Gardening'' named Shofuso the third-ranked Japanese garden in North America in 2004, 2008, and 2013 out of more than 300 Japanese gardens in North America The Journal of Japanese garden, November/December 2008, p22
See also
*
List of houses in Fairmount Park
__NOTOC__
This list contains all of the extant historic houses located in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Most of the houses are referred to as mansions due to their size and use as the summer country estates of Philadelphia's affl ...
*
List of Japanese gardens in the United States
This list of Japanese gardens in the United States contains gardens, museums, institutions and other organizations which features gardens designed and created in traditional Japanese style that are open to the public.
Gardens
References
Japa ...
*
Philadelphia Register of Historic Places The Philadelphia Register of Historic Places (PRHP) is a register of historic places by the Philadelphia Historical Commission. Buildings, structures, sites, objects, interiors and districts can be added to the list.
Criteria
According to the Phila ...