Yoshimasa Builds Higashiyama Palace

Ashikaga Yoshimasa began building Higashiyama Palace in 1482 on the site of Jōdoji, where his brother Yoshimi had previously lived as a monk. Yoshimasa had already passed the shogunal office to Yoshihisa. He moved to Higashiyama in 1483 and took Buddhist vows in 1485, but his continuing authority and household connections made the residence part of Kyoto’s political life.

Construction proceeded across several years. Tōgudō dates to 1486, followed by work on a meeting hall and waterside buildings. The Kannon hall associated with 1489 became the building later called the Silver Pavilion. The whole palace program remained incomplete when Yoshimasa died in 1490. His death brought a further change: the residence became Jishōji, a Zen temple named from his Buddhist title.

The project drew on earlier architectural and garden models. The relic hall at Kitayama and buildings at Saihōji provided precedents for the Kannon hall; Saihōji’s landscape also informed the garden. Yoshimasa consulted the Zen monk Yokokawa Keisan. Residential rooms, devotional halls and spaces for receiving visitors developed within the same complex.

Tōgudō and the Kannon hall survive from this building program, although the grounds have undergone later changes. Their different functions and construction dates help explain how a retired shogun’s residence became the temple now known as Ginkakuji. The present name and layout cannot stand for every building that Yoshimasa planned or used.