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Kyū-Furukawa Gardens

park in Japan

Architectural plans, a scale model, maps and brass measuring instruments
Places and architectureInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 7, 2026
Entity authorityQ3082256 ↗
Source-derived summary

Kyū-Furukawa Gardens (旧古河庭園, kyū-furukawa teien) is a Tokyo metropolitan park in Nishigahara, Kita, Tokyo. The park includes a Western-style mansion, a Western-style rose garden, and a Japanese-style garden, all of which were built in early 20th century.

Outline

The gardens were built by Baron Toranosuke Furukawa. The Western-style mansion and garden were designed by English architect Josiah Conder and were completed by 1917. Conder was called the "father of Japanese modern architecture" and also designed Rokumeikan, Kyu-Iwasaki-tei Garden, and Holy Resurrection Cathedral. The Japanese garden was designed by Ogawa Jihei VII and was completed in 1919.

Baron Furukawa was the owner of Furukawa zaibatsu which owned Ashio copper mine.

Western building and garden

The exterior of the building and the ground floor rooms are designed in the Western style, but the second floor rooms are mostly in Japanese style with tatami mats. The mansion is built on a steep slope of Musashino Terrace. The building is located on the top of a hill, with the Western-style garden on the slope, and Japanese garden on the bottom.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Kyū-Furukawa Gardens” is park in Japan. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Kyū-Furukawa, Gardens and park, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA valuable geographic starting point for tracing changing names, boundaries, uses and administrative responsibility. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1917, 1919—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1910. For this dossier, Kyū-Furukawa, Gardens and park is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “park in Japan” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3082256. VIAF identifies the subject as 252684446. Authority coordinates are 35.743, 139.747. 2 of 10 selected statements include explicit references; 7 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1917 and 1919.

Critical limits

Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.

Best used for
  • Historic place names
  • Jurisdictional context
  • Routes into maps and plans
Verify next

Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Kyū-Furukawa Gardens”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Kyū-Furukawa Gardens primary sources, Kyū-Furukawa Gardens archive and Kyū-Furukawa research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Kyū-Furukawa Gardens”?
  2. Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
  3. What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Kyū-Furukawa Gardens” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.