Ice chambers were built in cold areas close to the capital. The Tsuge chambers were made on the Yamato Heights, a range of hills riding some 500m above sea level on the north-eastern edge of the Nara Basin, where the imperial capital was located. It was cold, but not cold enough to keep ice for use in the summer months by natural processes alone. The land had to be molded, and seasonal tasks performed, by people for the ice to remain. Tsukamoto examines how people engaged with the natural environment and discovers precursors of modern landscape design.

Large ice chamber remains dot the Fukusumi district. Tsukamoto observes that the local people discovered the landscape’s suitability for the construction of ice chambers by recognizing the different properties of the valleys and ridges. “They must have noticed the places where the snow was slow to melt and stayed a long time. Once it was understood that ice could be kept for summer use, they wanted to do more, because it was interesting and useful, and banded together and started delivering to the court.” The wooden tablets describe the numbers, scales and structures of the chambers, and also such aspects as management techniques. Tsukamoto says, “I feel like I am reaching out and touching that landscape.”

“The relationship between the ice-making ponds and storage chambers was based on reading and using the topography of ridges and valleys,” says Tsukamoto. “They managed the landscape by felling surrounding trees, for example, so that leaves would not fall into the ice. The conditions for ice chambers were all here.” Tsukamoto expresses surprise at how well the people matched their activity to natural transitions from the movement of sun and shadow to passage of the wind.
Tsukamoto says of the integration of ice chambers to the lives of these ancient people, “It is fascinating simply to imagine how they managed and used the land.”

The electric icemaking machines that appeared from the Meiji Period made cheap ice widely available. The old icemaking techniques were briefly revived in the post-war period due to widespread power cuts but only for a very short time. Relying on memory, a group of village elders then clubbed together in 1999 to build a replica thatched ice chamber. The new tradition began of storing three tons of ice in February for use in a summer ice festival. It turns out that the amount of ice which lasts through to summer is closely dependent on the weather. Tsukamoto describes the remaining ice as a real treat.
“This is a good practical example of research through design,” says Tsukamoto. “We don’t know but by imagining and taking up the challenge, and by means of repeated trial and error, we can take it to the point where we say it must have been this way because of the providence of things.” Tsukamoto is fascinated by this process of corroborating history through practice.