Inakadate Rice Paddy Art
licensed photograph掬茶 / CC BY-SA 3.0

Tsugaru · InakadateNo.1284★★Open in map →

Inakadate Rice Paddy Art

cultureOff the trail — and worth it

Giant pictures planted in rice of different leaf colours, in the village where rice paddy art began. You look down on each year's new work from the observation deck of a village office built in the shape of a castle.

  1. FromHirosaki Station
  2. ~25 minKonan Bus from Hirosaki Station
  3. Get off atHatanaka (Konan Bus, Hirosaki–Kuroishi line)
  4. On foot
  5. Inakadate Rice Paddy Art
Directions ↗

The sweet spot

This is not a hidden spot. Inakadate is where rice paddy art began, and the idea has since spread to farms across Japan. What visitors tend to miss is the viewing angle. The design is planned to be seen from above at a slant, so standing beside the paddy is the wrong way to look at it.

Where it is

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What to look for — in walking order

Inakadate Village Officeくろふね / CC BY 3.0
  1. Castle-style village officethe village office building, given a castle keep and a main gate
  2. Fourth-floor observation deckthe open-air deck above the field; the sixth-floor keep is closed to visitors
  3. The first venue fieldthe paddy east of the office, planted with that year's picture
  4. Yayoi no Sato viewing towerthe second venue at Roadside Station Inakadate, with a separate picture and a stone artwork

How to actually get there

  1. Hirosaki Station → Hatanaka by Konan Bus bound for Kuroishi or Okawara, about 20 minutes.
  2. Hatanaka → Inakadate Village Office, about 3 minutes on foot.
  3. Buy a ticket at the ground-floor machine and go up to the fourth-floor deck.
  4. For the second field, plan a separate trip via Tanbo Art Station on the Konan Railway.
Konan Bus from Hirosaki Station
From in front of Hirosaki Station, take a Konan Bus bound for Kuroishi or Okawara and get off at Hatanaka, a ride of about 20 minutes. The village office is about 3 minutes' walk from the stop. Check the Konan Bus timetable before setting out.
Back to Hirosaki
Return from Hatanaka on the same line toward Hirosaki. Last entry to the deck is half an hour before closing, so set the length of your visit against the return bus times rather than the building's hours.
Directions from my location (Google Maps) ↗

About the place

Rice paddy art treats a flooded field as a canvas. Rice with purple, yellow or white leaves is planted among ordinary green rice, and the picture appears as the plants grow. Inakadate now works with seven colours of rice, and the subject changes every year. The first venue is the paddy on the east side of the village office. The office itself is built like a castle, keep and all, and its upper-floor deck looks down over the whole field.

How to enjoy it

The deck is open from early summer to around mid-October, on dates the village sets each year, and only in the daytime. Colours are at their strongest in high summer, once the rice has filled every gap. From late summer the leaves fade and the background turns gold, and after the background rice is cut the picture stands up on its own against the stubble.

Background & history

Rice has deep roots here: paddy remains from the Yayoi period were found in the village at Tareyanagi, now a national historic site. The art began in 1993 as a village revitalisation project, using three colours of rice. In 2003 the village planted the Mona Lisa, and by its own account she looked bottom-heavy when seen from the tower. Designs after that were drawn in perspective for the viewing angle, and a second field at the roadside station joined in 2012.

Before you go

Cash
Admission is charged separately at each venue, from a ticket machine at the ground-floor entrance. There is no combined ticket for the two fields. Prices are revised from time to time, so take the current figures from the village's official page.
Before you go
The deck opens only during the viewing season. In strong wind or rain the outdoor deck may be closed for safety. Eating, drinking and smoking are not allowed on the deck, and tripods and monopods are banned.
Another way
From JR Kawabe Station on the Ou and Gono lines, a taxi takes about 10 minutes. The second venue sits beside Tanbo Art Station on the Konan Railway's Konan Line, at Roadside Station Inakadate. The two venues are some distance apart, so treat each as its own stop.
After you get off
From Hatanaka bus stop, walk east for about 3 minutes to the village office. The castle keep on the roof marks the way.