- Japanese: 延遼館 (enryoukan)
The Enryôkan was a Western-style building on the grounds of the Hama Detached Palace (Hama rikyû) built originally by the Tokugawa shogunate as a naval academy,[1] and later modified to serve as lodgings for foreign dignitaries. It served as the chief site for housing foreign dignitaries from 1869 until 1883, housing such esteemed individuals as Prince Alfred (second son of Queen Victoria & first British royal to visit Japan), Ulysses S. Grant (first [former] foreign head of state to visit Japan), and King Kalakaua of Hawaii (first reigning monarch to visit Japan).
It is unclear precisely what these lodgings were like, but Grant describes it as "spacious, beautifully decorated, and built for summer purposes."[2]
In 1883, the Rokumeikan was completed, and took over the Enryôkan's function; much of the Western-style furniture and furnishings from the Enryôkan were moved to the Rokumeikan at that time.[3]
There are currently plans to rebuild the Enryôkan in time for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. It will serve both as a historical/tourist site, and to house elite guests.
References
- ↑ Richard Chang, “General Grant’s 1879 Visit to Japan,” Monumenta Nipponica 24:4 (1969), 376.
- ↑ William M. Ferraro, “Engagement Rather than Escape: Ulysses S. Grant’s World Tour, 1877-1879,” in Edward O. Frantz (ed.), A Companion to the Reconstruction Presidents 1865-1881, John Wiley & Sons (2014), 377.
- ↑ Dallas Finn, "Reassessing the Rokumeikan," in Ellen Conan (ed.), Challenging Past and Present: The Metamorphosis of Nineteenth-Century Japanese Art, University of Hawaii Press (2006), 233.