The project for such an establishment was launched during a meeting in Japan between the President of the French Republic François Mitterrand and the Japanese Prime Minister Zenkō Suzuki.

The MCJP was inaugurated on May 13, 1997, by the President of the French Republic at the time, Jacques Chirac,[1] and by Princess Sayako.

It includes, among other things, an exhibition hall, two multi-purpose rooms of 500 m2 and 130 m2, a library and a traditional tea pavilion.

The house presents exhibitions, shows, film screenings, conferences, and workshops and classes on Japanese culture: ikebana, calligraphy, go, manga, origami and Japanese tea ceremony.

A conference on the indigenous Ainu minority in Japan was given on October 3, 2016, at the MCJP; on this occasion the team of the library of the Culture House prepared a profile on this people showing the first documentation of Ainu language is the Ainu-English compiled by the English missionary John Batchelor.