Mt. Hiei Hotel

The Mt. Hiei Hotel (Eizan Hotel) was a stylish mountain-lodge resort hotel designed by architect Murano Tōgo (村野 藤吾). Under the management of the Miyako Hotel, it was located close to Shimeigatake cable station on Mt. Hiei, and had 13 rooms starting at ¥14 for an American plan. Promotional literature like the Miyako Hotel's Season's Greetings drew attention to "its attractions of the four seasons" — cherry blossoms, "cool summer foliage," "glorious maple tints," and "the poetic snow-range" — but, as the postcard above suggests, it was aimed particularly at summer vacationers: "an ideal summer resort where mercury does not rise above F 72° [22 degrees Celsius] even in the midst of the hot season." 

Similar to the Daibutsu Hotel, another hostelry managed by the Miyako Hotel group, it was relatively short-lived: the Mt. Hiei Hotel opened in 1937 and closed a few years into the Pacific War in 1943. Along with the Miyako Hotel, the Mt. Hiei Hotel also played host to participants in the 2nd Oriental Tourism Conference (October 1939), with a JTB event being held there (Kokusai Kankō, Dec. 1939).

More recently, as this YouTube video shows, the little that remains of the Mt. Hiei Hotel today attracts a new kind of visitor: hikers doing "ruins tourism" (haikyo kankō 廃墟観光).