Kumamoto Castle Tower

As a "symbol of reconstruction," we convey the thoughts and history of the people who have repaired after every disaster.
The Kumamoto earthquake in April 2016 caused damage to the castle tower of Kumamoto Castle. In response to people's longing for the symbolic castle tower to return to its original form, the city of Kumamoto set a policy of early restoration of the tower. The building was completed in March 2021 with the latest earthquake-resistant technology.
It carries on the wishes of the people who repaired the castle after repeated disasters over the 400 years since its construction, and contains messages from the people of Kumamoto living in the present for the next 100 to 400 years.

displays organized the theme from the basement to the top floor in chronological order to create a corresponding space concept design, and created an easy-to-understand and impressive space using models, images, and wall concept design.
It focuses on the castle tower, not the castle as a whole, and conveys the history of the castle construction, its architectural design, its defensive function, the castle and town development, and the thoughts and history of the people who restored the castle after every disaster.


[Social Issues/Customer Issues/Requests]
・To convey the historical, architectural and spiritual significance of the castle tower, which is a symbol of restoration from the Kumamoto earthquake. In addition, it should be reported that Kumamoto Castle, which has historically suffered from numerous natural disasters, was revived by the recent earthquake.
・Focusing on the "Kumamoto Castle keep" rather than the entire Kumamoto Castle, displays content of the surrounding facilities, division of roles, cooperation and complementarity should be promoted.
・Since there are many restrictions on the preservation environment in the castle tower, displays of the actual materials should not be done basically, and the history displays of the keep of Kumamoto Castle after the Seinan War should be added, which has not been done before.
・From the perspective of Universal concept design, we will introduce touch displays and multilingual voice guides so that a wide range of people can enjoy displays.
I received the above request.


[Solution]
With the castle tower as the main character, the story is organized along a time line from the castle's construction to the present, and each floor has a theme for each period.
The story is arranged so that you can follow the period from the lower floor to the upper floor. The first floor is the period of Kiyomasa Kato, who built the castle, the Hosokawa period, who became the lord of the domain after that, the modern period, which experienced a complete fire and reconstruction, and the present day, when the Kumamoto earthquake and recovery efforts were made. In addition to the building of the castle tower, we focused the images on the strong will of the people who repaired it every time after repeated disasters since the Edo period "I want to restore Kumamoto Castle and pass it on to future generations."
Furthermore, to cater to a wide range of visitors, multilingual audio guides and palpable models of the keep were planned and realized.


[Customer Comments]
displays is structured in a way that is easy for anyone to understand and attract interest, such as explanations using models and projection mapping, and a multilingual audio guide using the title sign application, and has been well received by visitors.


< our company Project Members >
[Development] Masanobu Yokoyama
[Sales and Project Management] Masashiro Yokoyama, Haruka Amano, and Annin Sawada
【 design, layout 】 Mitsuyo Ashida, Yuichiro Tsutsumi, Toshie Makigara, Nanako Wajun, Yoichi Honda, Naoya Fujiwara
[Shape] Nobuyuki Endo
[Production/construction] Iketani Yu, Kimura Yoshikazu