The site is located in a historical park established in a deep green valley in Osakaʼs Minamikawachi district, well known in Japan as an area containing a cluster of kofun (mounded tombs). The stone arrangements of more than a hundred tombs remain inside the park, which extends over some 30,000 square meters, and the vicinity is dotted with at least another hundred tombs in addition to four Imperial tombs.

Designed as a contemporary kofun, the museum unfurls under a large stepped rooftop clad in thousands of granite pieces. The roof becomes a plaza from which to enjoy the imposing views of the environment. In contrast, the interior of this museum covered by stairs is a space of ‘underground gloom’ that brings to mind being inside a tomb. At the center is a permanent exhibition room, a double-height void shaped as if imitating a zenpo koen kofun (keyhole-shaped mounded tomb). From the guest entrance on the first floor level, visitors descend a slope describing a gentle arc while looking at excavated artifacts distributed along the room shape, and are guided to an underground space containing an enormous model of a mounded tomb that is the climax of the exhibition...[+]