紫
Former proprietress / Grandmother
Kazama Murasaki
1935 — present
Named for the wisteria, the flower she loved her whole life. She passed the Tale of Genji and her father's notebooks on to the young Kaede. She now rests quietly in central Kyoto.
Chapter 03 — Origins
When the inn took its place.
Momijiyado is said to have taken its place in these hills generations ago. Without a signboard, with only a noren, it stood quietly to the side of the road climbing into the mountains.
From the beginning, the inn turned around the four seasons — cherry in spring, the riverside dining of summer, maples in autumn, camellia in winter — and welcomed guests with each.
Arashiyama hills / autumn mist
II. — Three generations
Murasaki — Tsubaki — Kaede
椿
Previous proprietress / Mother
Kazama Tsubaki
1968 — 2020
The one who planted the camellia that still blooms in the courtyard. She passed in winter, in the gap between snowfalls. She is now in the tree.
Married — Kazama Akira (head chef)
楓
Current proprietress
Kazama Kaede
November 20, 2001 — present
Born at the height of the maples, she grew up beside her mother's namesake tree. She read Japanese literature in Kyoto and returned when her grandmother went into recuperation.
III. — Chronology
A history, in years.
- Mid-Meiji (c. 1880s) Momijiyado takes its place in the hills of Arashiyama. No signboard; only a noren at the entrance.
- 1935 Murasaki (紫) is born.
- 1959 Murasaki takes on the role of proprietress at a young age. She inherits the Tale of Genji manuscript from her mother.
- 1968 Tsubaki (椿) is born.
- Spring 1985 At seventeen, Tsubaki plants a single camellia sapling in the courtyard. It still blooms.
- 1995 Tsubaki succeeds as proprietress. The same year, Akira enters from a Kyoto kitchen.
- Nov 20, 2001 Kaede (楓) is born — the morning of the maples at their fullest.
- Winter 2020 Tsubaki passes between snowfalls. Her tree continues to bloom in the courtyard.
- Autumn 2024 Murasaki goes into recuperation. Kaede returns and takes on the role of proprietress.
- 2026 Momijiyado — still here, in Arashiyama.
"Across the autumn fields she sent a messenger, with a letter of valerian flowers."
— from The Tale of Genji, "Yūgao". The book Murasaki loved.
IV. — The Genji connection
A line back to the old stories.
Murasaki loved the Tale of Genji from her youth, and laid the hearts of its women, drawn from its pages, over the settings of the inn.
Kaede also read Japanese literature at university in Kyoto. She still weaves the poems left in her grandmother's notebooks into the inn's quiet settings, season by season.
Oku-Saga / mossy stone steps