Future Living : Collective Housing in Japan

161 Pages·2014·29.328 MB·English

by  Claudia Hildner

Future Living

Claudia Hildner
Future Living
Collective Housing in Japan

BIRKHÄUSER | Basel

Introduction
6 About this Book: Architecture for Living Together
by Claudia Hildner
11 Beyond Modernism
by Evelyn Schulz
Collective Housing in Japan
28 Soshigaya House | Be-Fun Design + EANA
34 Tokyo Apartment | Sou Fujimoto Architects
40 Setagaya Cooperative House | Hitoshi Wakamatsu Architects
44 Yokohama Apartment | ON design & Partners
48 Nerima Apartment | Go Hasegawa & Associates
52 One-Roof Apartment | Akihisa Hirata Architecture Office
58 Share Yaraicho | Satoko Shinohara + Ayano Uchimura
64 Slide | Komada Architects’ Office
70 Apartment I | Office of Kumiko Inui
74 Yotsuya Tenera | Akira Koyama + Key Operation Inc.
80 M-apartment | Shinichirō Iwata Architect
84 NE apartment | Nakae Architects, Akiyoshi Takagi, Ohno Japan
90 Yuima-ru Nasu | + New Office
94 Trois | Mitsuhiko Satō Architects
98 Dancing Trees, Singing Birds | Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP Architects
104 12 Studiolo | CAt (C+A Tokyo)
110 Onagawa Container Temporary Housing | Shigeru Ban Architects (VAN)
114 Alley House | Be-Fun Design + TAS-S
120 Sakura Apartment | Hitoshi Wakamatsu Architects
124 Alp | Akihisa Hirata Architecture Office
130 Komatsunagi Terrace | Mitsuhiko Satō Architects
134 Shakujii Pleats | Makiko Tsukada Architects
140 Applause Azabu | Salhaus
146 Static Quarry | Ikimono Architects
150 Apartment in Kamitakada | Takeshi Yamagata Architects
156 Appendix
Claudia Hildner
About This Book
Architecture for Living Together
Single-family homes are only rarely semipublic areas that are used jointly by
residents who are initially unknown to one another. In the architecture of collective
housing, however, the relationship of the individual to the community becomes
an important theme. The integration into the urban or rural context also plays a
different role in “large” houses than it does when designing a single residence.
The blocks or ensembles that form the architecture of collective living cannot be
as easily swallowed up by their environment as, say, an individual small house can:
They crucially influence their environment and are like small cities within the city.
Farewell to Modernism
With its focus on collective housing in Japan, this book can be regarded as a
supplement to the publication Small Houses, 1 which was published by Birkhäuser in
2011 and approached Japanese residential architecture from the perspective of the
typology of the single-family home. But why does it pay to investigate the univer-
sal topic of housing by focusing on a single country? Several acute social phenom-
ena of industrialized nations are much more clearly pronounced in Japan than in
other countries. Because of strict immigration policies, demographic change is
progressing more rapidly there than elsewhere. At the same time, the structure
of households is also transforming rapidly: Rather than in the three-generation
families that were long common, more and more people are living alone today,
not wanting children and/or unable to take care of their aging parents. The rifts
opening up in many areas of society, not just in Japan, contrast with the circum-
stances that led to the global success of the Modern movement in the twentieth
6
A logo identifies the type of century: rapid economic and population growth, faith in progress, and internation-
building for each project: alization have given way to stagnation and a complicated battle against crises.
At the same time, more and more people are thinking about local identity and are
concerned with sustainable lifestyles. These processes of transformation are also
shaping the young generation of Japanese architects, who have set out in search
of an alternative to Modernism, of a new architectural utopia – a theme that con-
nects them across different approaches and methods. Hence the title of this book,
Multistory apartment building: Future Living, does not refer to a vague future but instead describes a revolution
Common entrance, including as
a rule a shared central stairwell. in the present and thereby distinguishes itself from architecture that feels a debt
to modern living. The projects presented reveal the structures and ideas that Japa-
nese architects are using to overcome the functionalism that characterized last
century’s residential architecture.
Architects are certainly well aware of the extent of these revolutions: “The
Row house: All units have
a separate entrance on the products of modern thinking – whether about architecture, agriculture, or other
ground floor; predominately areas – are increasingly obviously bumping up against their limits; they are con-
multistory units/maisonettes.
fronted with the same problems with regard to the environment,” 2 observes
Akihisa Hirata, for example. Ecological sustainability and energy efficiency are,
however, generally interpreted differently in Japan than in many parts of the West-
ern world. The idea of the short useful life has deep roots in a culture influenced by
wood construction and ideas of religious purity and renovation, so that the long-
Communal housing: As a rule, term performance of the individual building is only rarely considered. But Japan also
a common entrance on the
has advantages over most other industrialized nations in matters of sustainability:
ground floor; one room that fills
an essential housing function for example, the distinctly lower demand for floor space generally means low use
and is used jointly. of construction materials and energy.
The overwhelming majority of the residential buildings presented in this book
were not built on the initiative of large investors. They are primarily buildings
belonging to private property owners with four to ten residential units. It was not,
Multifamily home:All unitshave however, their scale that was the selection criterion for this publication; rather,
a separate entrance; some are
smaller sizes seemed to be invitations to experiment. Whereas for large projects
accessed via off-center steps.
few developers will dare risk their planned profit by introducing new types of floor
plans and structures, private clients clearly have the confidence to experiment
more with their limited area and create exciting hybrids of single-family home and
residential block. The adaptation of collective living to a changed society results
“from below,” as it were, from small private projects that flourish thanks to the
Housing complex: Group of
political and economic situation.
several buildings with separate
entrances; at least one building
used jointly.
Dissolving and Reconnecting
The scale of the projects presented here corresponds to the logic of large Japa-
nese cities based on many small elements, which has been increasingly recognized
7
and encouraged by architects but also by politicians. For the International Archi-
tecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale in 2010, the architects Koh Kitayama,
Yoshiharu Tsukamoto, and Ryūe Nishizawa presented their concept of “Tokyo me-
tabolizing,” 3 which defined Tokyo as a “city of houses” that is always reinventing
itself by constantly renewing small architectural elements. According to this argu-
ment, the large Japanese city is essentially characterized by residential buildings.
Conversely, in many current designs the context of the city also serves as inspira-
tion, and so it is recognized in that way. The supposed chaos of individual buildings
is distilled into structures that are adopted on a smaller scale and realized as new
dwellings. An important role in this is played by the traditional residential areas of
large Japanese cities, which are distinguished by, among other things, their lively
lanes (roji) and their atmospheric density (on this, see Evelyn Schulz’s introduction,
p. 11 ff.). In the Japanese Pavilion at the Biennale, the architects presented two fin-
ished residences on a 1:5 scale: Bow-Wow House and Studio, which combined the
home and workplace of the husband-and-wife architects in one building, and Ryūe
1 Claudia Hildner, Small Houses:
Nishizawa’s Moriyama House. This ensemble for seven occupants, created in 2005
Contemporary Japanese Dwell­
for a client who was open to experimentation, is located typologically between a ings (Basel, 2011).
single-family home and a house share, between multistory apartment building and
2 Akihisa Hirata, “Tangling: Plä-
small housing development. The design conveys an idea of what the relationship of
doyer für eine neue Architektur
the individual to society could look like today and reveals the ambivalence between der Verflechtung,” in “Tokio: Die
the desire for an individual lifestyle and the search for identity. The ensemble has Stadt bewohnen,” Arch+ 208
(August 2012): 76–81.
been understood both in Japan and abroad as an exemplary realization of a concept
for future living. 4 3 Koh Kitayama, Yoshiharu Tsu-
kamoto, and Ryūe Nishizawa,
Tokyo Metabolizing (Tokyo,
Moriyama House can be used to demonstrate several design considerations
2010).
addressed in Japanese architecture today: The ensemble consists of ten volumes,
but the areas that are related functionally are not necessarily located in the same 4 Niklas Maak, “Japonisiert
euch!,” Frankfurter Allgemeine
volume. The program was not condensed into units as compact as possible and
Sonntagszeitung, no. 43 (Octo-
then hierarchically arranged but rather articulated as individual components and ber 25, 2009): 21.
then reconnected. “The house of the future overcomes the idea of a compact
5 Sou Fujimoto, “Die Architektur
volume in favor of a number of different bodies integrated into the city and dis- der Primitiven Zukunft,” in
solved within it,” 5 as the architect Sou Fujimoto describes this approach. Hence “Tokio: Die Stadt bewohnen,”
Arch+ 208 (August 2012): 66–71.
the design is marked by a process of dissolving that leads to new relationships
between the components and to the city. The focus is no longer the compact- 6 Sou Fujimoto, Primitive Future,
ness of the building and its function but rather its networking and structure. Contemporary Architect’s Con-
cept Series 1 (Tokyo, 2008), 24.
Fuji moto sees this as the “nest” being replaced by the “cave”: “a nest is prepared
according to inhabitants’ sense of comfortability while a cave exists regardless of 7 Atelier Bow-Wow, Behavioro­
convenience or otherwise to its inhabitants […] it is not organized in the name of logy (New York, 2010), 13.
functionalism but by place-making that encourages people to seek a spectrum of
8 Yoshiharu Tsukamoto, “Me-
opportunities.” 6 tabolismus der Zwischenräume:
Neue Typologien des Wohnens
in Tokio,” in “Tokio: Die Stadt
Moriyama House can, however, also be read as an ensemble developed around
bewohnen,” Arch+ 208 (August
open spaces. The spaces in between are not just setback areas but rather extend 2012): 30–34, esp. 34.
8
the private living spaces into the exterior. This new role for the interim space was
first advocated by the architect Yoshiharu Tsukamoto of Atelier Bow-Wow: “The
regeneration of houses would revolve not around a core, but a void – the gap space
between buildings – and would be propelled by the initiatives of individual families,
rather than the accumulation of central capital.” 7 In this interpretation, the dis-
solution of compact structures reveals the rearrangement of the remaining areas
and gaps resulting from the progressive subdivision of lots during the twentieth
century. Increasing density has led to building codes that primarily define property
lines and setbacks. Architecture is increasingly becoming a byproduct of gaps be-
tween buildings, says Tsukamoto. 8 He and other Japanese architects counter this
development with designs in which the space in between can adopt a new role, and
in which its indeterminacy permits a variety of uses. By contrast, the core has lost
its significance as one of the essential elements of modern architecture.
The Structure of This Book
This book is divided into two sections: In her introduction Evelyn Schulz works
out the fundamental cultural aspects of collective living in large Japanese cities
since the seventeenth century. The focus of her reflections is on the structures of
the typical residential neighborhoods in which most of the buildings presented in
this publication were built and whose context now serves – in contrast to several
decades ago – as inspiration for many architects’ designs. The examples pre-
sented in the project section that follows it convey a comprehensive picture of the
architecture of collective living in Japan. The focus is concepts for coming up with
forms and designing floor plans; they are presented with photographs and plans
and explained in an accompanying text. To make it easier to read the drawings, the
individual residential units in the more complex designs have been indicated by us-
ing different colors in the floor plans and sections.
9