Kyoto, Japan
EASTERN Design Office
Post By:Kitticoon Poopong
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The holes are lined up on a cross shape. The hole is made on the architecture like the perforated line. This architecture is “House with Crest”.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
A light that penetrates into the architecture always moves and never stays. It is a symbolical spectacle. A light that goes through the hole is projected in a circle shape, moves unlimitedly, and never stays. Occasionally, it disappears, and it appears.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The site is located in Gojo, Kyoto. It is in a block of the typical division of a traditional
residential area in Kyoto. The site faces the busy street of 4m in width on the west side. The backside of the
high-rise buildings of 45m line up on the east side of the site. The neighbor houses are closely built in the south and the north of the site.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
We “lift the one-storied house to the sky” to create calm interior space. It is lifted to 3m in the sky. The space under that is lent as a parking lot.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The one-storied house lifted to the sky makes “two outside spaces placed among three inside spaces”. The wind and the light of nature gather from the sky into two outside void spaces. And that extends to three inside spaces.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The arrangement of the spaces from the street side to the back is in such an order as “inside – outside – inside – outside – inside”. This clear arrangement works mutually and intermediately to unify the whole architecture.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The street front space is the workshop for the crest making. The middle space is the living room. And the backspace is the bedroom. The gaps between those three spaces are designed as “void”.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
People circulate around those two voids. Many circular holes are made for the place where people wander. The light passes through 26 holes which are lined up on a cross shape. We can see various scene of light and its sequence. People move beautifully with the movement of dramatic light.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The client is a traditional craftsman who puts the crest on Japanese traditional clothes. The merchant in the wholesale store brings here a lot of Japanese clothes to ask for the crest work. He goes up the staircase that has the wall with perforated cross line. The client puts the crest on the clothes and gives those back to him. He dashingly goes out to the town in the Kyoto to go back with those. The client’s daughter circulates with the light to prepare the crest work. The movement of the circular light brings a happiness of this house in.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The workshop area and the living area are separated and also connected. The client and his daughter have such living style. The crest making is a delicate work and also a business work. It is quiet, and also busy.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
The drifting cloud is seen, and they finish working, and relax in the living room at the middle space. The reflected light becomes an infinite line of light and extends into the darkness of twilight on both side window of the living room. And the dark becomes deeper. In this one-storied house lifted to the sky a night goes on like that.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
Two street side walls overlap on “Mise (show/shop)” space from right and left as like the breast of the Kimono. The “breast” interior becomes the shop space. The circular holes made for a cross shape becomes a pattern that decorates the wall as a crest. The kind of the crest reaches 7000. Any complicated crest pattern is formed from circle.
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| Photo © Courtesy of Koichi Torimura |
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| situation plan--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| first floor plan--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| second floor plan--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| south elevation--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| west elevation--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| section A-A--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| axo--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
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| perspective--drawing Courtesy of EASTERN Design Office |
The people
Architects: EASTERN Design Office + HOJO Structure Research Institute
Location: Kyoto, Japan
Client: Morita MON factory
Site Area: 236.90 sqm
Total Floor Area: 259.78 sqm
Project Year: 2007
Photographs: Koichi Torimura
