Byōdō-in temple, Uji

During my short residency at Fujukawa Kuoka-en in Osaka a couple of years ago, I was wandering what to do on my weekly day off. My bonsai instructor Maeoka-san pointed at the obverse of a ten-yen coin and said: “Go to Uji, it’s very peaceful there”.  I thought if this place is depicted on their money, it has to be amazing. I was aware that Uji is famous for its tea, but knew little about Byōdō-in temple depicted on the coin. A quick Internet search informed me that the temple began its existence in 1052 when a Fujiwara clan country house was converted into a temple. The construction of its most beautiful and famous building known today as the Phoenix Hall was completed in the following year (see images above and below). The coolest thing about the Phoenix Hall is that it’s a wooden structure which hasn’t been burned or destroyed for nearly a thousand years. What we see today is roughly how it looked during the heyday of Heian period. So, for me, visiting Byōdō-in was like time travel.

Byōdō-in museum was fascinating too, but photography was prohibited. All temple buildings except Phoenix Hall were burnt down during a war in the 14th century, so the other buildings reflect later architectural styles (see images below). To sum up, Byōdō-in is one of the most beautiful places I’ve seen in Japan.