Hasta La Ideas

Readers have been discussing “the abundance of introverted architecture that is coming out of Japan” recently, so here’s another Japanese house that blocks all views to and from the street but still draws light and air inside.

The single-storey house by Satoshi Kurosaki and APOLLO Architects is located in a residential neighborhood in Hodogaya Ward, Yokohama.

A wall behind the public approach allows for only a glimpse of the private courtyard within.

The windowless perimeter wall and a winding alley from the entrance give privacy to its single resident by leading visitors around the back of the living space.

Black floating steps creep up the courtyard wall to a terrace.

Large glass doors allow in light from the main courtyard and can be slid open to extend the living area.

Like boxes within a box, the living space and bedroom sit as separate elements within the perimeter wall but remain connected to the two courtyards and each other.

Photography is by Masao Nishikawa.

We’ve published a number of stories by APOLLO Architects & Associates including a house that features a pointy overhang and another house with no exterior windows. See all our stories by Apollo Architects and Associates.»

Here’s some more information from the architects:

MUR

This one-storey residence for a single woman is located in a hilly area.

The client requested a house with an internal courtyard that would eliminate the differences in elevation throughout the site while ensuring a sense of privacy and comfort.

In response, we decided to model the facade after a simple box encircled by the walls of the building.

In order to prevent the interior from becoming just a simple one-room space, we considered each of the necessary components to be a “story.”

Opening the door reveals a partial glimpse of the private courtyard that extends beyond the slender window in front of you.

A glass entrance door stands at one end of the long, narrow porch, while the skylight at the top fills the interior with a soft, gentle light.

The house is laid out in such a way that you can bypass and go around the long, narrow alley to arrive at the main living area.

In contrast with the dimensions of the alley, this voluminous space can also be integrated with the internal courtyard when the large sliding door is opened.

The bedroom, a small breakaway space that lines up with the large central portion of the building while being detached from it, also connects to the backyard, which is itself linked to the dressing room.

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All of these living spaces were designed to invariably face the exterior while also ensuring a certain level of privacy.

Two different spaces and two gardens, laid out with a slight lateral deviation between them: a complex, nuanced interior was created just using a series of simple manipulations.

In contrast to the simple facade that resists being influenced by the exterior environment, a unique, individual and complex worldview takes shape within the interior of the house.

The manifold surprises that emerge from this process are precisely the essence of the “narrative” that we tried to create – the key to coaxing fresh perspectives out of both everyday and extraordinary life experiences.

Architecture: Satoshi Kurosaki/APOLLO Architects & Associates

Project Outline

Location: Hodogaya Yokohama Kanagawa
Date of Completion: Summer 2011

Principal use: private house
Structure: wood
Site area: 276.64m2

Total floor area: 80.39m2 (80.39m2/1F)
Structural engineer: Kenta Masaki
Mechanical engineer:Zennei Shimada

Material information

Exterior finish: acrylic emerson paint
Floor: solid flooring;Tiled/1F

Wall: plaster
Ceiling: plaster

Japanese architects Katsutoshi Sasaki + Associates have completed a four-winged house in Toyota.

The metal facade of the Oshikamo house conceals a timber interior and two sheltered courtyards.

Skylights between exposed rafters let natural light into an open-plan living room at the centre of the house.

Ladders climb up into loft bedrooms in two of the wings, above a third bedroom and a large walk-in closet.

The third remaining wing contains washrooms, while a space used for quiet contemplation occupies the fourth.

This is the third house by Katsutoshi Sasaki + Associates featured on Dezeen – see our earlier stories about one with rooms in separate blocks and another shaped like a triangle.

Photography is by Toshiyuki Yano.

Here’s a little more text from Katsutoshi Sasaki:

Oshikamo

Prerequisite

The lot is located in a residential area and is surrounded by neighboring housings, with a mother’s house on its west.

Requests for the house include: encourages the family to spend time together (rather than isolating anyone) / spatial / bright with plenty of natural light.

Plot

The family space is arranged at the center of the site.

The private space is arranged at the edge of the site, and they connect gradually by the one volume.

Distance among rooms and curved spaces provide adequate privacy.

Each rooms are indistinctly connected to each other via central space.

Indistinct

That indistinct connection is the key concept of this house, expressing the spatial relationship (not on/off relationship) among the rooms. Like a photo out of focus.

Invisible one room

You can grasp the space visually if the entire space is visible.

You can let your consciousness develop the space if not all is visible. Like walking in a path, not sure of what is ahead.

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Ambiguously

Spaces divided by straight lines relate to rationally. Spaces connected with curving lines relate to ambiguously. 
Like a drop of milk in coffee.

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Connection

What interests us is how rooms connect to each other, more than how a room is made.
What interests us is the “air” that curves, crosses, and diffracts. Like a cloud, constantly moving without having definite shape.

Location: Toyota Aichi Japan
Site Area: 191.71m2
Built Area: 84.18m2
Total Floor Area: 101.94m2

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Type of Construction: Wooden
Exterior Materials: Metal finish
Interior Materials: paint finish

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Design time: June 2010 – February 2011
Year of completion: September, 2011

Design team: Katsutoshi Sasaki + Associates
Structure company: Masaki structural laboratory
Construction company: Inoue construction Ltd

See also:

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Complex House by Tomohiro Hata	Ogaki House by Katsutoshi Sasaki	House with Gardens by Tetsuo Kondo

This top-heavy house by Japanese architect Kota Mizuishi overlooks a river in west Tokyo.

The steel-clad upper floor of the two-storey House in Horinouchi cantilevers forward to create a small sheltered car parking space below.

This upper floor houses a bedroom, a kitchen/dining room and a living room, where two projecting windows integrate a narrow desk and a balcony.

A ladder leads up from this floor to a mezzanine loft.

A master bedroom and bathroom are located on the ground floor.

We’ve published a few popular stories about residences in Japan in recent weeks, including one screened by a grid of timber louvres – see all our stories about Japanese houses here.

Photography is by Hiroshi Tanigawa.

Here’s a little more text from Mizuishi:

River side house / House in Horinouchi

This is a very small house built on the triangle site where the river and the road were crossed and made to the acute angle.

For the dead-end road, it became a plan in various regulations for obtaining special permission.

Residents are husband and wife and a little girl.

Although it was a novel site of a limited area, since a river was faced through a bank and a promenade, I would like to design various relations with the river.

The building is the form that cut an acute angle part on a triangle plan derived from the site. Furthermore,it got the maximum volume of hip roof of three planes in restriction of setback-line.

Although the level 0 floor was a private space, it limits for dividing with the curtain of a race in the door, stairs, storage, etc. except for a bathroom. It enabled it to feel a spread.

The level+1 floor is devided into small areas by structural narrow walls, being connected with one by the ridgeline of a roof. So there are different open feelings and the relations with the river each.

That is

1. dining&kitchen / The west side space up the stairs is the largest planarly, and has high ceiling with a feeling of rise towards the roof top.

2. living / The central space is low ceilinged,and has full-opening windows on both sides as a balcony and the bay window that spreads outward with a feeling of floating

3. spare room / The east side space in the deepest is a form which is narrowed down to the direction of flow of the river, and is a space watching the light to insert earlier of the abyss.

4. loft / The space with two skylights is a space looking down at the river and looking up at the sky.

The limited volume snuggles up to the river, and I think that I was able to make various space that can live while looking for a favorite place to stay.

Project info:
Location: suginami,tokyo,japan

Type: residential house
Architect: Kota Mizuishi / Mizuishi Architect Atelier

Structural engineer: Kentaro Nagasaka
Lighting designer: Tatsuoki Nakajima

Contractor: Hirano-Kensetu
Site area: 52.14m2

Building area: 29.07 m2
Total floor area: 55.24 m2

Structure: wood
Story: 2

Build cost: 15,500,000 yen
Period: March,2010 – April,2011

See also:

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Double House by Tsuyoshi Kawata	Hi House by Yosuke Ichii	Near House by Mount Fuji Architects

A grid of timber louvres screens the end facades of this Japanese house by architects AE5 Partners.

A fold in the middle of the two-storey House M divides it into two symmetrical halves.

Openings on both sides of the fold create entrances leading into an open-plan living room on one side of the house and bathrooms on the other.

A mezzanine library overlooks the living room from the floor above, while a bedroom is located opposite.

Another gridded timber screen inside the house creates a first-floor balustrade.

You can find more Japanese houses on Dezeen, including one with slides between floors, by clicking here.

Photography is by Nacasa & Partners.

The following information is from the architects:

House M, Kaga-shi Ishikawa-ken Japan

Context

Along a series of lushly green mountains narrow rice field terraces are divided by a mountain stream.  Surrounded by this complicated yet beautiful, abundant nature, a settlement can be seen in Kashiwano-machi, a town in Kaga city, Ishikawa, Japan.

The project site was established in an gap between a national road and the edge of the city. How should the building be designed to fill the space in of a town that was slowly built up over a long period of time by people and nature? The foundational concept of the plan should proceed from the climate, the culture, and the historical context and, what is more, it should express modernity. It was thought that this approach may be necessary and most natural for the residents and town people.  A “Kura” (Japanese warehouse) is a feature of the typology of the town. It is a secondary house that can be seen anywhere since every house in the town has a Kura.

With small, aesthetic proportions, it fills the space and distance between houses and it helps block the prying eyes of neighbours. It can be said that the planning site complies with the traditional construction style of the town: a house like a Kura with a few open doors is built between a busy national road and the head house in which the client family lives.  Additionally, the volume of a Kura suits the current “a house for a woman living alone” theme.

While moving forward with the plan, the typological aspect of the Kura was used within the constraints of the building’s site and context to specialise the process. The process begin like this: a decision was made using a volume study that maintained the proportions of the dialogue between the building plan and the surrounding environment. Then, between the head house and the building plan, a chevron shaped courtyard was made way for, creating a complete assembly whose plan is known as Kunoji. Between the Kunoji and the main house the space became a welcoming courtyard and, at the same time, the north-western side of the Kunoji produced a small space that answered the client’s request of having a private garden.  Via this process an architectural shape that acts as a part of the town was derived.

Geometry
 Embracement / Louvered Facade

Kuras stand with dignified and steady beauty. To acquire the shape, the building’s level surfaces and the exterior were designed with appropriate geometric proportions. The flat surfaces use two squares and isosceles triangles. The elevated surface toward the Tsumagawa (the side that contacts the ridge at a right angle) was constructed using Silver Ratios. The one of a Kura’s features is that it has only a few open doors. This relates to the house owner’s privacy. It is carefully designed to protect the dwellers privacy; The Tsumagawa facade was changed to wooden louvers so that it gets bright daylight; the wooden pieces are arranged to face in a constant direction at every other step.

The intent of the configuration of all of the louvers references the concept of “order and the unexpected”. There is an old persimmon tree in front of the louvers that was planted a long time ago. At first glance the randomness with which the branches and leaves grow seems to have a constant regularity which, when combined with the louvers opposite, abides by the concept of “order and the unexpected” to create a dialogue between nature and the architecture. Additionally, a polygonal shape was used to design the top lights placed on the 2nd floor terrace above and the open windows facing the road.  Doing so, the contrast of the order (mathematically proportioned) in the flat and elevated surfaces against the free lines of the open windows attempts to bring into being a pleasantly designed harmony. The lights coming from the open windows or wooden louvers change seasonally and, according to the time of day, produce a rich tapestry of colour for an entire lifetime. On the other hand, the lights of the open windows add small flares of colour and warmth to evenings wrapped in silence or seasons covered in snow.

Surface  86 sqm

See also:

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Julia’s Apartment by Moohoi Architecture	Agbaria House by Ron Fleisher Architects	SN.House by atelierA5

This house in Nagoya by Japanese architect Tomohiro Hata has five roofs that pitch in opposing directions.

This alternating roof creates a series of triangular windows on the first floor of the two-storey residence, which the architect named Complex House.

A recessed corner entrance interrupts the ridged metal cladding, which also encloses a courtyard.

Tomohiro Hata also designed a house with a three-storey wooden house hidden inside it – see this story here and see more Japanese houses on Dezeen here.

Photography is by Toshiyuki Yano.

Here’s a description of the project from Hata:

We examine a row of small rooms towards the depth on demand of a client who wants many small rooms.

After the order fixed, we examined each width depending on suitable scales of the rooms.

We edit composition of the sections.

They melt together or overlap each other on the first floor and are integrated in the space for the family.

Come to think of it, a family is the smallest unit of social groups and to build a house like this way might be natural consequence and effective way in the time that individuality is naturally respected among his or her family.

Besides, we take client apart to individuals at the same way of planning “complex house”.

Then we examine and express clearly the rules or orders for them to let each of them essentially participate to the planning process.

In this way, we could propose such dwelling space that somewhat different from existing one.

Title: Complex House
Location: Nagoya, Japan

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Design: Tomohiro Hata Architect and Associates
Construction year: 2011

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Site area: 107.30m2
1F area: 54.43m2
2F area: 45.81m2

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Total area:100.24m2
Structure: Wooden

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See also:

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Daylight House by Takeshi Hosaka	Branch House by KINO Architects	Hi House by Yosuke Ichii