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Architects: Akio Isshiki Architects
- Area: 73 m²
- Year: 2023
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Photographs:Yosuke Ohtake
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Manufacturers: NOMIZU Co., Ltd.
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Lead Architect: Akio Isshiki
Text description provided by the architects. A wooden house near the beach was renovated into the designer's residence and workplace, as well as a curry restaurant. What I was conscious of while designing this house was about "mixed". I proceeded with the design while paying attention to the various mixes surrounding this house, such as usage, culture and nationality, time and space, town and house, work and life. In designing, I thought that it would be possible to renew the mundane "multinational house" by understanding the roots and cultural background of my own once again and mixing the essence of foreign countries with traditional materials and techniques of this area.
For example, the floor of the dirt floor is tiled because this area used to be a major producer of tiles. These tiles were handcrafted one by one by tile craftsmen in Awaji, with the image of lava stone pavements seen in cities in Central and South America superimposed on the texture and edge shape. Conscious of the tropics and nostalgia, we put nets that look like mosquito nets and Sudare blinds on the Shoji screens. The graceful plans created by imperfect partitions such as Shoji and Fusuma are typical of ancient Japanese architecture. In this house, the space is also connected in the cross-sectional direction, and the drooping plants native to the tropics moderately separate the spaces. The wall opposite the sea on the second floor is a scraped wall mixed with red iron oxide and finished by a plasterer from Awaji. This is an attempt to incorporate the colorful walls of each country into architecture in a Japanese context.
I thought that the mixture of time axes would create depth in the space. Instead of emphasizing the contrast between old and new or matching the whole to the old, I considered old materials and designs as one of the elements with a certain time axis, and aimed to create a space where we can feel the long span of time as a whole, including the newly added parts. It is a space that is both old and new. Old and new pillars and beams are jumbled up and down, and new Shoji screens are layered so that the existing figured glass can be seen through. For the door handle, I installed something I bought on a trip and I don't know when it was made. The cypress pillar stands on top of natural stones that give a feeling of timelessness. Materials with various time axes are mixed and coexist. The newly added materials are selected to enhance the taste with age and to always make you feel beautiful with time.
Here, the various things that surround the house are mixed together while maintaining their vitality and essence. In this house, there is an air of generosity like the sea that accepts all things and leads the consciousness of those here beyond the horizon. On the second floor of this house, there is a large window that cuts out only the sky and the sea.
