Photo/Illutration This five-storied pagoda, seen at Koshoin temple in Ishikari, is the first of the type to be constructed in Hokkaido. (Ryo Kudo)

ISHIKARI, Hokkaido--When Koshoin Temple officials sought to build a wooden pagoda here, they were told it would be impossible to erect one in these northlands, where winds and snow rage and frost does severe harm to such construction.

“Government officials initially told us they would only approve a steel-frame structure,” said Kako Sato, Koshoin’s head priest.

Yet, a five-storied wooden Buddhist pagoda, with a whiff of the air of an ancient capital, was finished recently in this northern city in late October, about a 30-minute drive from JR Sapporo Station.

The vermillion structure rises tall in the middle of the blue sky and the ground covered in green, which border on each other along the horizon.

Seeing it evokes an unfamiliar sensation, as if the pagoda, which would typically fit into the landscape of one of Japan’s ancient capitals, stood within a computer-generated image.

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The pagoda, the first of its kind in Hokkaido, was completed at Koshoin, a temple of the Shingon Sect Buddhism. 

The northernmost wooden five-storied pagoda in Japan rises 33.3 meters tall.

The temple was founded in 1980.

It is under the control of Daigoji temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site in Kyoto, and is known as the operator of Barato Cemetery.

Both Koshoin’s grounds and the graveyard cover vast expanses that are the hallmarks of Hokkaido.

“My predecessor’s dying wishes were to make Buddhist culture flourish here in this northern land like it once did in Oshu province’s Hiraizumi,” said Sato, 68, in referring to the UNESCO World Heritage site in today’s Iwate Prefecture.

Sato succeeded his father, who died in 2014, and set about planning the pagoda’s construction.

He said he regretted that 150 years after full-scale development started, Hokkaido still had few places where people could go to join their hands and pray.

A steel-skeleton structure wouldn’t last even for a century, but a wooden one could stand for a millennium if only proper repairs were made, Sato said he thought as he insisted on a pagoda of wood being built.

The temple was designed by Yoshio Yonehara, a former head of design with major general contractor Taisei Corp., who had worked on traditional architecture projects. 

The 76-year-old resident of Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture, had designed two other five-storied pagodas in the past.

“The plan nearly came to a standstill midway this time around,” Yonehara said. “I had to redesign the pagoda many times over.”

He obtained snow and wind data from a Hokkaido-based research institution and drew on it to forecast the impact on the pagoda for structural calculations.

He thereby learned that the snowfall in the area isn’t too heavy and was unlikely to remain abundantly on the roofs, but the area is prone to strong northwesterly winds.

Yonehara decided to use copper roofing instead of tiles, which could break when water freezes in the winter.

He also decided not to board the floors beneath each layer’s railings so snow would filter through to the roofs below.

Yonehara set the pagoda base at a height of 2.4 meters to remain above the snow cover, which rises to a depth of 1.8 meters on the temple grounds in a normal year.

He also had 24 29-meter-long piles driven underground to firm up the soil.

“The marriage of tradition with contemporary technology has allowed this pagoda to be erected in these northlands,” Yonehara said.

The structure was modeled after Daigoji temple’s five-storied pagoda, which was built during the Heian Period (794-1185).

Yonehara tried to get close to re-creating the beautiful shape of the artifact in Kyoto, which is counted among the Three Greatest Pagodas of Japan.

Koshoin’s pagoda took three and a half years to complete.

“This pagoda will watch over Hokkaido’s development over the next 1,000 years and keep guard over the happiness of its residents,” Sato, the head priest, said. “I am dreaming of the day when the pagoda will be designated a national treasure.”

His remark evoked the spirit of pioneers, who carved out vast horizons in bygone years.

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