Handa Red Brick Building

The Handa Red Brick Building (半田赤レンガ建物, Handa Akarenga Tatemono) is a historic brick warehouse located in Handa City, Aichi Prefecture, Japan. It is certified by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan as one of the Heritage of Industrial Modernization of Japan [ja] sites and plaque locations. The site consists of three buildings: the original main building, a storage building, and a half-timbered building. Before renovations, the inside of the building was open to the public several times a year, but seismic reinforcement work and refurbishing was carried out between 2014 and 2015. Since July 18, 2015, it has been open to the public at all times (excluding New Year's Eve and New Year's Day).
In 1898, the building was constructed as a beer factory for Marusan Beer, before it became Kabuto Beer. The floor plan was designed by the German firm called Germania Maschinenfabrik and then implemented by architect Tsumaki Yorinaka, who worked on other industrial projects including the Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse.
In 1944, during World War II, it became a clothing warehouse for Nakajima Aircraft Company.
After the war, it was used from March 1950 as part of the cornstarch manufacturing process (mainly a product storage warehouse) of Nippon Shokuhin Kako, which was established in July 1948.
In the early summer of 1994, Hideo Baba, the chairman of the Kyoto citizens' group "Red Brick Club Maizuru", learned that the factory was set to be demolished. He contacted his younger brother, Baba Nobuo, who had been working as the general manager of Nakano Brewery. The brothers believed that in order to preserve the red-brick building, local residents simply had to know how valuable the building was. At the request of his brother, Baba Nobuo entered into negotiations with the Planning and Coordination Division of Handa City.
On March 19, 1996, Handa City signed an agreement to purchase approximately 34,000 m² of the former Nihon Shokuhin Kako factory site for approximately ¥3.047 billion yen.
In August 1997, Baba Nobuo and others formed a citizens' group called the Handa Red Brick Club (半田赤レンガ倶楽部), now called the Red Brick Club General Incorporated Association of Handa (一般社団法人赤煉瓦倶楽部半田).
In August 2002, Handa City and the Handa Red Brick Club opened the red brick building to the public for the first time. 8,600 people attended the two-day event.
On July 23, 2004, the three buildings (the half-timber building, the main building, and the storage building) were registered as tangible cultural properties of Japan, and on February 23, 2009, they were recognized by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry as a Heritage of Industrial Modernization site.
Renovation work began in 2014, and the facility reopened as a tourist facility on July 18, 2015. Since its opening, JTB Promotion Inc. has managed and operated the facility, but Toyota Enterprise Corporation has been the designated manager since April 2020.
The building was hit by the 1944 Tōnankai Earthquake, the 1945 Mikawa Earthquake, and the Handa Air Raid, but it has remained intact to this day, and the scars from machine gun fire from P-51 fighter planes during the Handa Air Raid can still be seen on its walls.
In March 2022, a building was constructed that is a full-scale reproduction of the Kabuto Beer billboard, approximately 10m tall, that stood at Nagoya Station during the Meiji period. The old advertising tower in Nagoya was featured in the Ghibli film The Wind Rises and was built by the city to attract tourists before the opening of Ghibli Park.
The following facilities were newly established with the reopening.