Architects: Ikeda Yukie Architects / Ikeda Yukie, Ohno Toshiharu
Location: Nakano, Tokyo, Japan
Program: House, Apartment
Project Area: 118.5 sqm
Project year: 2009
Photographs: Koichi Torimura & Ikeda Yukie Architects
Originally, the second floor was an old style Japanese lodging with several walls dividing the floor into tiny rooms. Since then, numerous renovations and extensions were carried out. Immediately prior to our joining the project, the second floor was used as a part of family house – a bit chaotic and still with a scattering of columns, remnants of the old walls.
In order to comply with Japanese law, any changes to the structure of a wooden house situated in a fire protection area would require approval and take considerable time. The client was interested in a quicker turn-around and therefore we could not remove the all-too-many forest-like columns.
The remaining structures other than columns weren’t suitable to be seen. We started by wrapping them which allowed for the forest-like columns to stand out beautifully.
To counteract the ‘busy-ness’ created the columns, we placed between them movable boxes which function both as storage and partition.
In order to minimize the other elements, we utilized white wrapping. This ultimately resulted in forest-like columns as colours seemingly floating in space.
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- original building
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- original building
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- original building
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- original building
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- original building
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- original building
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- original building
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- site plan
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- first floor plan
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- second floor plan
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- section
Extremely cool! What a simple and powerful thing! I liked how the pillars are very grouped at the center of the space, so the contrast between the “forest” and the white walls around seems to dilate the space… Well done!
extremely cool space; but where is the apartment?
I wonder if the occupants will ever walk straight into one of those poles on accident?
I appreciate how effectively a compromise is turned into an interesting expressive element…Demonstrates how working within limitations provides opportunity to do somthing a little weird or awkward…rare thing in ground up buildings…fun. real.
Please tell me why this is remotely interesting as architecture?
How cool it is when something unexpected comes from a project or renovation and you end up incorporating it your plan to make into something completely different and yet, it works amazingly well here, those wooden posts look quite intriguing and fun. Very Good project. it may not be the great scream for architecture advancement but it sure is a fine example of a solution to a problem.
does anyone know how many people died during the construction of this project?
88 people died