Uchiko Town — Wax Merchant Preservation District

**Three key houses:** Omura House (大村家) shows the full wax cycle — haze berry harvest, steaming vats, wooden presses squeezing oil from crushed berries, filtering screens, and the final wax blocks. Original equipment still fills the workshop floors. Kamihaga Residence (上芳我邸) operates as a guesthouse (¥8,000/night with breakfast) where you sleep in merchant bedrooms. Honhaga Residence displays family business ledgers showing wax sales to Osaka and Edo, plus photos documenting the shift from wax to modern business after petroleum killed the market. **Wax-making details:** Haze trees (sumac family) produce berries harvested December–February. Workers steamed berries to soften them, crushed them in wooden vats, then pressed the pulp in lever-operated presses. Raw wax oozed out, was filtered through silk screens, and cooled into white blocks. This wax burned without smoke or smell — critical for tea ceremony candles. Before petroleum, mokuro dominated Japan's lighting market. The Omura House workshop demonstrates each step using 200-year-old tools. **Kabuki theater mechanics:** Uchiko-za (内子座, ¥400 entry) opened in 1916 with a rotating stage powered by stagehands pushing wooden gears underneath, trap doors for surprise entrances, and a hanamichi runway extending through the audience. The ceiling's painted clouds and cherry blossoms still show original colors. Performances happen 3–4 times yearly (¥3,000–8,000 tickets). Tour the backstage area to see the gear system and prop storage — everything's wood and rope, no electricity. **Sleep in a merchant house:** Kamihaga Residence rents rooms (¥8,000–12,000/night) in the actual merchant quarters. You sleep on futon in tatami rooms under 200-year-old beams, eat breakfast in the communal dining room, and access the interior garden with its stone lanterns and koi pond. After day-trippers leave at 17:00, the town goes silent. You'll hear wooden shutters closing and smell dinner cooking in neighboring houses. **Festival nights:** The Paper Lantern Festival (August 14–16) hangs 1,000+ washi lanterns along Yokaichi Street, lit from within by candles. The glow turns the white plaster walls golden. Autumn festival (October) parades portable shrines through the streets with taiko drummers and dancers in Edo-period costumes.