A literary-inspired escape on the site of a former ryokan, Design Hotels’ newest member Matsumoto Jujo is bringing a new revitalizing energy to the hot springs town of Asama Onsen. Comprising two equally striking yet different hotels—Matsumoto Honbako in the original structure and family-friendly Koyanagi—the 38-room property also features a bookshop, lifestyle store and bakery, and an Edo-period bathhouse.
With a scenic viewpoint overlooking the Northern Alps a short walk up the hillside, the setting is idyllic. Yet in recent years, many of the area’s shops and restaurants have closed, leaving a growing number of vacant buildings and contributing to a decline in visitor numbers. Matsumoto Jujo founder Toru Iwasa is seeking to reverse this trend, creating a vibrant social hub that draws both guests and local residents back to the area, with spaces including the bookshop and lifestyle store open to the wider public.
The brains behind lifestyle company Jiyujin Inc, Toru works as an editor, re-curating a place’s inherent charm and fusing old and new. He opened his first hotel, Satoyama Jujo, 12 years ago in Niigata Prefecture. Housed in a 150-year-old building with a modern extension, it quickly garnered a reputation for award-winning design, Michelin-starred farm-to-table food, and an open-air spa bath that faces Mt. Makihata. This was followed, in 2018, by Hotel Koo Otsu Hyakucho in Otsu, a town neighboring Kyoto in the Kansai region that was once a key stop on the Tokaido route. It is spread across seven restored machiya houses with Scandinavian interiors and, as part of the mission to rejuvenate the neighborhood, donates part of its revenue to shops and artisans.
At Matsumoto Jujo, the challenge was not only to renovate the existing concrete ryokan but reinstate the heritage atmosphere of the hot spring inn, whose roots date back to 1686 (the design concept for architects Suppose Design Office and Schemata was ‘connecting memories’). The Matsumoto Honbako part of the property has exposed concrete walls and is themed around books that are meant to be picked up and read (and, if guests like them, purchased too). Interiors are underdressed and dramatic, with grays, dark wood, and sisal carpets forming the backdrop for designer furniture by the likes of Alvar Aalto, Arne Jacobsen, and Isamu Noguchi.
In the Koyanagi new construction, rooms are also pared back, with tatami flooring or solid wooden floors, and folk art by artists such as Samiro Yunoki and Umetaro Azechi. Every room has an open-air hot spring bath. The building faces a Japanese-style garden, which features Koyanagi-no-Yu, an open-air bath inspired by traditional Edo-period bathhouses.
Two on-site restaurants celebrate local ingredients: Dining 367, a refined, live wood-fire experience with a Japanese fusion menu that tells the story of the Shinshu region, and Italian Alps Table for families with young children. Reception doubles as Okyaki & Coffee, a café serving hand-drip coffee alongside oyaki, Nagano’s beloved local specialty. There’s a lobby bar, plus two cafés a few minutes’ walk away in repurposed houses which encourage guests to discover the culture of Asama Onsen (as does a daily guided walking tour). Wellness, unsurprisingly, is intrinsic to the experience: the area’s restorative hot springs, once reserved for samurai, invite guests to slow down and unwind.
