Shuri Castle's rebuilt main hall finished, with five weeks to go before it reopens
Construction ended on 30 September. The public can go inside the Seiden from 23 November, seven years after the fire.
The main hall of Shuri Castle in Naha is ready. Construction of the Seiden finished on 30 September, almost seven years after a fire destroyed it, and the government's Okinawa office has set the public opening for Monday, 23 November, a national holiday. A completion ceremony is planned for the day before.12
Seven years of rebuilding
The fire in the early hours of 31 October 2019 burned the main hall and several other buildings. Work on the new Seiden began in November 2022, and the exterior was completed in July 2025. In September this year craftsmen finished the last of the lacquer work inside the hall and along its corridors, and the great dragon pillars at the front have been installed and carved in place.134
The design team began by digitising the hand-drawn plans from the hall's previous restoration in the early 1990s. The lead designer had worked on that project in his thirties and kept extensive notes and photographs from it.2
Shuri Castle was the royal palace of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1429 to 1879. Its site is part of a UNESCO World Heritage listing from 2000. Visits to the main hall will use advance tickets; details will be published on the park's website.1
Transfers 乗換
Where these facts come from. Numbers in the text lead here.
- 1Okinawa General Bureau, Cabinet Office首里城正殿の供用開始日について (PDF)
- 2Nikkei xTECH“メモ魔”の設計者が再登板、首里城正殿の復活支えたノートと秘蔵写真
- 3Okinawa Times / Kyodo首里城、漆塗装が完了 １１月公開へ準備着々
- 4Shuri Castle Park復興の軌跡
Spotted an error? Write to desk@noribanews.com · Corrections
H Stops on the Heritage Line
- H01Edo-Tokyo Museum welcomes its millionth visitor, six months after reopening
- H02Shuri Castle's rebuilt main hall finished, with five weeks to go before it reopensYou are here
- H03Kyoto's Jidai Matsuri goes ahead, with 2,000 people walking through a thousand years of costume