Hasta La Ideas

Japanese architect Kengo Kuma has completed a hotel in Miyazaki where guest rooms and dining areas surround a central courtyard and wedding chapel (+ slideshow).

Located on the site of a former factory, Garden Terrace Miyazaki comprises a single two-storey building that features bamboo-clad walls and a large sloping roof with overhanging eaves.

A faceted timber canopy shelters the entrance to the hotel, leading through to a reception where guests are faced with a view of the courtyard.

Kengo Kuma and Associates designed this space as a “calm and tranquil environment”, where a landscape of bamboo trees and pools of water provide a scenic setting to the glazed wedding chapel at its centre.

Restaurants and event rooms surround the other sides of the courtyard, while guest rooms are located on the first floor.

Kengo Kuma has completed several projects in recent months, including a timber-clad primary school in Tokyo, an installation of stone and water in Milan and an experimental house in Hokkaidō. See more architecture by Kengo Kuma.

Photography is by Fujinari Miyazaki.

Here’s a short description from Kengo Kuma and Associates:

Garden Terrace Miyazaki

The hotel was built at a vast site near JR Miyazaki station, where a factory once stood. Around it houses and aparrments spread in no particular order.

Facilities of the hotel – guest rooms, banquet room and restaurants are arranged to circle the courtyard.

Loosely sloped roof came out as the result of each function underneath. It wraps the entire building – two-storey structure under the deep eaves.

Bamboo is planted and water is laid out in and out of the hotel and its courtyard, providing a calm and tranquil environment that stretches even to the residential area.

Completion: September 2012
Main use: hotel
Total floor area: 4562.04 sqm

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Kengo Kuma and Associates appeared first on Dezeen.

Milan 2013: bamboo trees sprouted up around a topographical landscape of stone and water at this installation created by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma in Milan last month.

As one of three architect-designed installations for the Urban Stories exhibition of contemporary living, Kengo Kuma‘s Stonescape was designed as an interpretation of a traditional Japanese Zen garden.

Cascading stone strata formed a series of undulating curves around the room. Pools of water formed at some of the lowest levels, while others contained clusters of bamboo trees planted in gravel.

“The clean and pure Pietra Serena stone is used so as to recreate a topography that, as in real landscapes, moulds the shape of water, guides our walking and gives a context to the objects to better admire them,” says Kengo Kuma and Associates.

The installation was located in one of the buildings of the Porta Nuova Varesine complex, a new skyscraper district designed by architects including Cesar Pelli, Stefano Boeri and Nicholas Grimshaw. It was used as a showroom for furniture between 9 and 14 April, alongside spaces designed by Michele de Lucchi and Diego Grandi.

Other recent projects by Kengo Kuma include an experimental house in Japan and a fashion boutique in China. See more architecture by Kengo Kuma.

See more projects from Milan 2013, including offices of the future imagined by Jean Nouvel and a courtyard installation of rotating cork platforms by the Bouroullecs.

Photography is by Giovanni Desandre, apart from otherwise stated.

Here’s some more information from the exhibition organisers:

In the spectacular skyline of Porta Nuova Varesine in Milan, on the occasion of the Fuorisalone collateral event, three exceptional architects are ‘staging’ three extraordinary suggestions of contemporary living.

Michele De Lucchi, Diego Grandi and Kengo Kuma, ‘tell’ their Urban Stories, through unique and thrilling installations, for an eagerly-awaited event, which supplements the busy schedule of Fuorisalone events.

Urban Stories, organised by MoscaPartners, with the collaboration of Hines, is a spin-off from the extraordinary success of Bologna Water Design 2012, the exclusive event dedicated to water design, which involved the city’s most prestigious venues during the Cersaie show in September.

The limelight is therefore cast on Urban Stories and its stars, who thanks to the enthusiastic participation of major leading companies in a variety of industries will give rise to charming captivating set-ups.

The focus of Urban Stories is the Porta Nuova Varesine complex, which is the result of an ambitious urban and architectural replanning project involving large areas of the Isola, Varesine and Garibaldi districts, developed and implemented by famous architects, including Cesar Pelli, Stefano Boeri and Nicholas Grimshaw, under the direction of Hines Italia Sgr, promoter and investor.

The original installations created by Michele De Lucchi, Diego Grandi and Kengo Kuma will transform the important display spaces of the ‘new centre of Milan’ into an exceptional cultural box, ready to welcome the curious multifarious public who animates the most important and eagerly-awaited international design event every year.

Urban Stories are therefore not just simple installations, but proper ‘seductions’, resulting from a sensitive way of designing to imagine the landscape within our cities and outside them.

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by Kengo Kuma appeared first on Dezeen.

This translucent cabin by architects Kengo Kuma and Associates is an experimental house in Hokkaidō, Japan, designed to test the limits of architecture in cold climates (+ slideshow).

Kengo Kuma and Associates were inspired by the traditional architecture of the indigenous Ainu, whose “Chise” style buildings clad with sedge or bamboo grass hold in the warmth of a central fireplace that is never allowed to burn out.

“The fundamental idea of Chise, ‘house of the earth,’ is to keep warming up the ground this way and retrieve the radiation heat generated from it,” say the architects.

The Experimental House was constructed around a coated larch frame and it has a thick layer of polyester insulation sandwiched between the polycarbonate cladding of the exterior and the glass-fibre fabric of the interior. This insulation was made using recycled plastic bottles and it allows light to pass into the house through the walls.

“Without relying on any lighting system, you simply get up when it gets light, and sleep after dark – we expect this membrane house enables you to lead a life that synchronises the rhythm of the nature,” the architects add.

As the first experimental house completed for the Meme Meadows research facility, the building will be used by the environmental technology institute to test how different factors affect the thermal qualities of its construction.

The internal lining can be removed for experiments, while a timber-framed sash window will also be examined.

The project was completed with support from the Tomonari Yashiro Laboratory at the University of Tokyo’s Institute of Industrial Science.

Japanese studio Kengo Kuma and Associates also recently completed a small hut held together with magnets and a Beijing store where aluminium screens evoke brickwork patterns. See more stories about Kengo Kuma.

See more architecture in Japan »

Here’s some more information from Kengo Kuma and Associates:

Meme Meadows Experimental House

We were in charge of the first experimental house, and in the process of designing, we got a number of clues from “Chise,” the traditional housing style of the Ainu. What is most characteristic about Chise is that it is a “house of grass” and “house of the earth.” While in Honshu (the main island) a private house is principally a “house in wood” or “house of earthen wall,” Chise is distinctively a “house of grass,” as the roof and the wall are entirely covered with sedge or bamboo grass so that it can secure heat-insulating properties.

Also, in Honshu the floor is raised for ventilation to keep away humidity, whereas in Chise they spread cattail mat directly on the ground, make a fireplace in the center, and never let the fire go out throughout the year. The fundamental idea of Chise, “house of the earth,” is to keep warming up the ground this way and retrieve the radiation heat generated from it.

Here is how section of the house is structured: We wrapped a wooden frame made of Japanese larch with a membrane material of polyester fluorocarbon coating. Inner part is covered with removable glass-fiber-cloth membrane. Between the two membranes, a polyester insulator recycled from PET bottles is inserted that penetrates the light. This composition is based on the idea that by convecting the air in-between, the internal environment could be kept comfortable because of the circulation.

We do not treat insulation within the thickness of heat-insulation material only, which was a typical attitude of the static environmental engineering in 20th century. What we aim at is a dynamic environmental engineering to replace it for this age. That we utilize the radiant heat from the floor is part of it, and it has been verified that you could spend several days in winter here without using floor heating.

The other reason we covered the house with membrane material was our longing for a life surrounded by natural light, as if you were wrapped in daylight on the grassland. Without relying on any lighting system, you simply get up when it gets light, and sleep after dark – we expect this membrane house enables you to lead a life that synchronizes the rhythm of the nature.

In one part of the house, a wooden insulated window sash is installed external to the membrane. It is a new device to monitor the living environment of the house by changing various types of sashes. Likewise, all glass fiber cloth in the interior can be removed so that we can continue many kinds of environmental experiment.

Above: ground floor plan – click above for larger image

Above: roof plan – click above for larger image

Above: section – click above for larger image

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by Kengo Kuma and Associates appeared first on Dezeen.

Les équipes de Kengo Kuma & Associates ont récemment proposé leur projet de création du musée d’histoire naturel de Copenhague. Renommé par les équipes japonaises « Garden of Natural History », cette proposition a le mérite d’impressionner et de donner envie de voir un tel projet prendre vie. Plus dans la suite.

Architects and designers including Kengo Kuma, Toyo Ito, Shigeru Ban, MVRDV and Konstantin Grcic have designed a series of downloadable architectural structures that are just for dogs (+ slideshow).

Organised by Kenya Hara, the creative director of MUJI, Architecture for Dogs is set to launch next week as an open-source network where dog-owners can download the templates for each of the thirteen designs, then build them for themselves.

Each designer was asked to think up a structure that would alter the way that people interact with their pet, so Atelier Bow-Wow have designed a ramp for a daschund (above) that helps it make eye contact with its owner, in spite of its short legs. “We thought about stairs, but their bodies are too long and they risk hurting their hips,” said the architects, explaining their design for a folding slope.

Meanwhile, Konstantin Grcic has designed a mirror for a poodle (above), as apparently it is the only dog that can recognise its own reflection.

Shigeru Ban has used his trademark cardboard tubes to create a maze for a papillon (above), while Sou Fujimoto has recreated the scaffolding-like structure of his House NA project in Tokyo in his house for a Boston terrier (below).

Sanaa‘s Kayuzo Sajima came up with a design for a fluffy white cushion (below) that matches the fur of the bichon frisé.

“Bichons love soft surfaces and snuggling into large blankets,” said Sajima. “The typical space designed for dogs in the interior of a house is at the convenience of the human and is frequently a cage-like container you keep in the dark corner of a room. This design however is a warm, inviting version of that crate.”

Kengo Kuma has devised a system of wooden components (above) that can be used to construct a hill, which a pug can either sit inside or climb up onto.

MVRDV wanted to “give the curious and playful Beagle a space of its own” and have created a gabled kennel (above) that rocks back and forth.

For a spitz, Hiroshi Naito has created a curving bed of tubes and wooden blocks (above), while Toyo Ito‘s design is a four-wheeled mobile home for a shiba (below).

As chihuahuas are known to love burrowing, Reiser + Umemoto thought the best structure for one would be a comfortable outfit (below). “We wanted to create something that would make the dog feel protected and safe,” said the architects.

Other structures include a reimagined hammock by Torafu (below), a staircase in a box by curator Kenya Hara and an upside-down suspended cone by the Hara Design Institute.

The Architecture for Dogs website is set to launch on 15 November, when people will be encouraged to upload photographs of the structures they’ve built and share any improvements they’ve made.

The structures will also be presented in December as part of Design Miami.

Other designs for dogs on Dezeen include a special staircase at a house in Vietnam and a combined chair and kennel.

See more stories about animals »
See more stories about open-source design »

Photography is by Hiroshi Yoda.

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curated by Kenya Hara appeared first on Dezeen.