Japanese domestic architecture has changed a lot in the last 100 years, but Western-style architecture was slow taking off and in fact the modern Japanese architectural establishment owes its organization, training system and much of its sense of style to one man: Josiah Conder.
Conder was invited by the Meiji government in their effort to emulate the Western powers. Born in London in 1857, Conder worked for William Burges, one of the leading architects of Victorian England. Two years into his apprenticeship his design for a country house won a major architectural prize and prompted an invitation to work in Japan.
Initially contracted for five years, he arrived in Japan in 1877 and was immediately appointed a professor at the Imperial College of Engineering (later merged with the University of Tokyo) and an architect to the Ministry of Public Works. It was an extraordinary assignment for Conder, who didn't have a single building to his credit, but things went well: his starting salary of 333.33 yen was soon rounded up to the princely sum of 400 yen a month.
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