Nagoya Castle

A Tokugawa stronghold, Nagoya Castle rises over the heart of the city with its broad stone ramparts and gleaming golden roof ornaments, one of the great fortresses of early modern Japan. It was built in the early seventeenth century on the orders of Tokugawa Ieyasu to guard the strategic route between Kyoto and the east and to seat a senior branch of his ruling family, and it grew into one of the largest castles in the land.

The golden shachi are its emblem. Perched at either end of the main keep's roof are a pair of gilded shachihoko, mythical tiger-headed fish, whose glint of gold has symbolised Nagoya for centuries and still adorns the city's souvenirs and manhole covers. The keep seen today is a mid-twentieth-century reconstruction, the original having burned in wartime bombing, but it faithfully echoes the towering silhouette of the lost fortress.

The palace is the true treasure. Alongside the keep, the Honmaru Palace has been painstakingly rebuilt in timber using traditional methods, its rooms glowing with reproductions of the gold-leaf screen paintings and sumptuous carved transoms that once received the shogun's representatives. Together with the surrounding gardens and moats, it conveys the wealth and authority of the Tokugawa age.

For a visit, the castle grounds are a short walk from a dedicated subway station and charge a modest admission. Spring is the standout season, when hundreds of cherry trees blossom along the moats, while autumn brings fine foliage. Allow two to three hours to take in the keep exterior, the reconstructed palace and the gardens, and check ahead, as parts of the keep may be closed for structural work. The reconstructed palace, glowing with gold-leaf screens, is for many the highlight that outshines even the golden roof.