Nijo Castle

Nijo Castle was the Kyoto base of the Tokugawa shoguns. Tokugawa Ieyasu ordered the feudal lords of western Japan to help build it from 1601, and it was completed under his grandson Iemitsu in 1626. It later witnessed one of the turning points in Japanese history: in 1867 the last shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu, announced the return of governing authority to the Emperor in the Ninomaru Palace. The site became an imperial villa, passed to the city in 1939 and is now one of the seventeen sites that make up the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto. The year 2026 marks the 400th anniversary of the Kanei imperial visit.

The Ninomaru Palace is the highlight. Its six connected buildings, made almost entirely of hinoki cypress, are National Treasures, and the rooms are lined with sliding doors painted by artists of the Kano school, showing tigers, pines and seasonal scenes intended to impress visitors with the shogun's power. As you walk the corridors in socks, the floorboards chirp: these are the famous nightingale floors, whose sound comes from metal clamps rubbing against nails. Photography is not allowed inside the palace.

The castle grounds cover around 27 hectares inside two rings of moats and walls. The Ninomaru Garden, with its pond and arranged stones, lies beside the palace, and the inner Honmaru area holds a palace from the late nineteenth century, partly moved here from the former Katsura Palace, and the stone base of the original keep, which burned down in 1750. Climb the keep foundations for a view over the grounds. The gardens are planted with cherry and plum trees, which makes spring a popular time to visit.

The castle is open from 8:45, with last entry at 16:00 and closing at 17:00. The grounds close only from 29 to 31 December, but the palaces have extra closing days: the Ninomaru Palace closes on Tuesdays in January, July, August and December, and the Honmaru Palace on the third Monday of each month and the following day. Tickets can be booked online in advance. Allow around one and a half to two hours.

Nijo Castle sits in the centre of the city, opposite Nijojo-mae Station on the Tozai subway line, and Nijo Station on the JR Sagano Line and the subway is a short walk to the west. It works well with a visit to the Kyoto Imperial Palace, a short ride to the north-east, or Nishiki Market and the downtown shopping streets to the east.