Main Entrance

Provenance

Camera: NIKON D810
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings: 14mm · f/9.0 · 0.6s · ISO 100
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

Sunlight enters through the main entrance doorway. Dust motes are visible in the light. Paint is peeling from the walls near the threshold. A faded sign sits above the entrance. Worn stone steps lead toward interior corridors. The space is still and unoccupied.

Edition

Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

Limited edition
A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

$100.00 AUD

Colour

Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 5 to 10 business days (unframed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.

See certificate sample →

Shipping Free shipping over $250. Ships worldwide, rates calculated at checkout.

Returns Damaged in transit? We replace it. Full policy →

Ships within 10 business days · signed & numbered

In situ

01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title: Main Entrance
Series: Family School Fureai
Catalogue: FSF-018
Process: Giclée
Captured: 28 April 2016
Camera: NIKON D810
Lens: 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture: f/9.0
Shutter: 0.6s s
ISO: 100
Focal length: 14 mm
Paper: Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size: 290 × 200 mm
Location: Yubari, Hokkaido, Japan
Authenticity: C2PA verified provenance →
Recognised by: Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards

02 LOCATION

Yubari, Hokkaido, Japan

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

The main entrance of Family School Fureai stands in Fukuzumi, on the northern fringe of Yubari, Hokkaido, along Prefectural Road 38. Sunlight reaches the threshold through the open doorway, catching dust in the still air. Peeling paint and a faded sign mark the entry point of a three-storey reinforced-concrete building that has sat without an operator since 2006. The building was constructed in 1975 as Yubari Municipal Asahi Elementary School, replacing the demolished Yubari Daini (Second) Elementary School on the same site. It consolidated three predecessor schools: Yubari Daini, Teibi, and Fukuzumi. Opening enrolment was 351 students across 13 classes. The coal economy that had sustained those families was already contracting when the building went up; the last of Yubari's 24 mines would close in 1990. Asahi Elementary closed on 31 March 1983, eight years after opening, when declining enrolment made even the consolidated school unviable. The building stood vacant for approximately a decade before Yubari Kanko Kaihatsu Co., Ltd., a third-sector tourism entity established by the city in October 1994, converted it into a public lodging and group training facility. Classrooms were repurposed with tatami mat flooring; communal bathing and dining facilities were added. The facility operated as Family School Fureai until 2006, when it ceased accepting guests as Yubari's fiscal crisis became public. The city had accumulated deficits of approximately ¥35.3 billion, of which the tourism business account contributed ¥18.6 billion, the largest single component at 53 percent of the total. Yubari Kanko Kaihatsu filed for bankruptcy on 2 April 2007, with total debt of ¥5.46 billion. Family School Fureai was not among the facilities transferred to the successor operator. The gymnasium roof, which predated the main building and had been retained from the demolished Yubari Daini school, collapsed under snow accumulation in January or February 2021. What the 2016 photograph records at the entrance is the building as it was left: worn steps, faded signage, and light moving through a threshold that once marked the boundary between outside and in.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

The main entrance of Family School Fureai in Yubari, Hokkaido, where dust motes drift through angled light and peeling paint frames a faded sign above worn steps. The building opened in 1975 as Yubari Municipal Asahi Elementary School, consolidating three predecessor schools at a moment when the coal industry that built this city was already in terminal decline. It closed as a school in 1983, was converted to group lodging in the 1990s, and ceased accepting guests in 2006, the year Yubari declared fiscal collapse.

Brett Patman

The series

Family School Fureai

2016 · 30 photographs

Family School Fureai stands on a hillside at the northern end of Yubari in Hokkaido. The building opened on 1 April 1975 as Asahi Elementary School, a new three-storey reinforced-concrete structure built on the site of the demolished wooden Yubari Second Elementary (Daini). It consolidated three local schools - Daini, Fukuzumi and Teibi - that had lost most of their students as Yubari's coal industry shrank. By the early 1980s enrolment had collapsed; the school closed on 31 March 1983 after just eight years. The building stayed empty until Yubari City's tourism third-sector firm Yubari Kanko Kaihatsu, established October 1994, repurposed it as the Family School Fureai public dormitory. In June 2006 Yubari City announced its fiscal collapse; the city formally entered financial reconstruction status on 6 March 2007 and YKK ceased trading 31 March 2007 with ¥5.46 billion of debt. The building has sat empty since. Inside there is no graffiti - only kanji on the chalkboards. Deer and foxes use it now.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.