Premium quality seafood from the Seto Inland Sea

Anyone who has a palette for traditional Japanese cuisine lavishly praises the fish caught in the Seto Inland Sea. We would like more people to taste our seafood dishes, which are prepared with great care and forethought. We are convinced that not only we Japanese but also our overseas guests will be delighted by their freshness and flavours while savouring our original seafood courses.

Immersed in Japanese aesthetics and harmony

The guest suites are designed with the intention of maximising the level of comfort that a traditional Japanese space can provide for our guests. The Japanese word, wa, means “something Japanese” and also “harmony.” Our decision to adopt a Japanese design is not to use the style for its own sake but to celebrate its potential for creating a peaceful space where everyone can enjoy a happy life by living side by side with nature and appreciating what each season brings.
Make the most of our open-air baths, where you can have a leisurely soak feeling the breeze from the woods while admiring the modern artworks that perfectly blend in with the Japanese interior. Come and live with the slow pace of the inland---tasting our freshly prepared dishes using the local produce and enjoying the architectural details in your room with which we tried to express our version of the ultimate contemporary Japanese style.

Travellers mingle around the hearth

One of the main features of our inn - a communal outdoor hearth, is set right in the middle of the property. From ancient times, we have gathered around the fire and imagined the unseen world of myths and magic.
By creating a place where both international and domestic modern art lovers can organically interact with each other around the fire pit, we hope to make art a more integral part of our lives.

The fire alight from sunset to 01:00
* The tea served by the owner is complimentary.
* The bar is open from 21:00- 01:00.

Incubator for emerging talent

Commissioned works by young artists are displayed around the inn. Once every six months, a selected artist is given an opportunity to show their works and offer them for sale in all the eleven suites.
With Mr. Shigeo Goto, a professor at Kyoto University of the Arts as our curator, we aim to make our ryokan an incubator for emerging talent and actively share information about domestic contemporary art.

Hamlet-like scenery where natural wonders and local lives coexist

In order to create a place of perfect harmony for nature and the locals, we started with an actual image of an ideal community fit for the given land, which we asked Mr. Shintaro Kojima to create. Mr. Kojima is a local Nihonga (Japanese-style painting known for its use of crushed mineral pigments) painter and the grandson of the founder of the Ohara Museum in Kurashiki. Seeing the houses quietly poised on the tiered land once used for rice cultivation inspired us to make our ryokan into a place where our guests can unwind and feel content just by feeling the connection with the surrounding nature.

By Shintaro Kojima, Nihonga painter

The front courtyard and hill behind

Greeting

Immerse yourself in art

I am the fourth-generation owner of an 88-year-old ryokan. The property is in a hot spring town called Yunogo with a 1,300-year-history in Mimasaka City, Okayama, tucked in the Chugoku mountain range. The area thrived with its iron production whilst giving birth to the culture of many other traditional Japanese arts and crafts. My ryokan in Yunogo showcases locally crafted wooden furniture and tableware as well as many artworks made with glass, which are well received by our guests.

One day, I was approached by a master carpenter with the idea of opening a Japanese-style inn in his hometown. He is originally from Naoshima and he lamented the lack of ryokans there saying, “it’s a shame, our overseas guests don’t get to experience the spirit of Japanese hospitality.” He planted a vision in me-to start a ryokan in Naoshima, a place that already attracts so many travellers from all over the world, but rather than focusing on the local crafts and the artisans’ skills, I would like to create a space featuring Japanese contemporary art. The guests are bound to experience unexpected surprises, leading to new ways of thinking, or the art with which they interact will spark an inner search within…these were some of my thoughts at an early stage of conceiving the ryokan.

Art is meant to shake up one’s mind, heal one’s soul and inspire one to take action. Interacting with artworks at Roka is different from seeing them at galleries and museums. Your experience with them is much deeper and more personal. Nothing makes me happier than witnessing new ideas and connections being made and sparked from your interaction with our art collection and with other guests at our ryokan.

A place to mingle at sunset in the Seto Inland Sea

With Roka, I am reliving some of the unforgettable memories from my own travels. During the two-year period after graduating from university in Tokyo, I visited 33 countries around the world from Southeast Asia back to Machu-Pichu in South America. That was back in 2001. Each place I landed on had its own charm and I remember my time there fondly. However, what I enjoyed the most was all the encounters with both the locals and the fellow travellers wherever I went. Trying to understand each other using all the communication tools available including gesture while coming up against language barriers was extremely exciting because it was like encountering their cultures themselves. Looking back, this was when I started having a vision for creating a place where people from all over the world can come together and freely share their stories.

April 2022. Naoshima Ryokan Roka was launched. This is a place where people from all over the world can mingle and connect regardless of their differences through art. My vision has been fulfilled.

I will not spare any effort in making our inn a centre for contemporary art that constantly inspires our guests to feel creative and providing experiences which no other ryokans in Japan can offer.

Naoshima Ryokan Roka Owner Shintaro Sasaki
Naoshima Ryokan Roka Owner
Shintaro Sasaki
【泊ってかがわ割専用プラン】瀬戸内の旬菜鮮魚を愉しむ会席コース▼このプランで選択できるお部屋デラックススイート1名様料金(2名様1室利用時)プレミアムスイートろ霞スイート【泊ってかがわ割専用プラン】寿司会席コース<1日限定9食>【自社HP限定】期間限定!癒しの旅☆お一人様10%割引<瀬戸内の旬菜鮮魚を愉しむ会席コース>

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