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Architects: bandesign
- Area: 2450 m²
- Year: 2018
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Photographs:Yasuko Okamura, Shigetomo Mizuno
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Manufacturers: Dymwakai, Sankyo Tateyama
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Lead Architect: Hisanori Ban
Text description provided by the architects. In order to creating new architecture, mathematical formula rules the architectural norms.
Involve is marked by the distinctive geometrical and economical structural system. The equi-angular spiral, logarithmic spiral in other word, has an inherent characteristic. Every triangle is similar figure, and every diagonal is same on that spiral. Taking advantage of the characteristic, the spiral allows the structural members of columns, beams, and cross bracing to repeat the same system of details at all connection and creates remarkable geometrical precision and patterned beauty by only adjusting the length of these structural components.
In general, a rectangular box-form industrial building limits people’s interaction. Within the rectilinear layout, users are constrained to move along the two-axis direction only; being stagnant. The spiral, on the other hand, is intended to maximize the flow and the number of interaction points; being fluid. In Involve the workers move spirally and contact and involve co-workers each other inevitably.
As a result, the norms secondly generate various benefit, improving quality, enhancing productivity, etc. The building configuration creates an active momentum between the people, products, and information. It maximizes the cross-communication of workers, to enhance their productivity and leads to the refinement of product’s quality in the facility. Within the vortex, from which, and through which, and into which, ideas are constantly rushing.
The new 2,450 square-meters facility of the client that is Kyokutoh is situated on a native hill in the city of Nisshin, Aichi-Prefecture. The profile of new building follows that of the original slope in landscape, while possessing a powerful and unique gesture in an urban context. The elaborate spiral-form gradually rises up from the ground, then culminates at the main entry facing the street with cantilevered canopy, radiating out of the building’s dynamic force.
The new appearance and landscape are intended to revive the site that was used to be forest. The buildings’ stone-sculpture-like presence in a hill, as if it is curved out from a single rock, is cladded with a galvanized stainless steel; a durable and maintenance-free material. The glass façade with the cantilevered canopy welcomes visitors, then orients them with the rhythmical interior ceiling. The glass wall, located along the periphery of office spaces, controls the daylight gain, and enhances user’s productivity.
The client, Kyokutoh is a cutting-edge company, manufacturing welding equipment in automobile industry. It carries a mission that a small-scale domestic company takes a lead in a global-scale, by creating “one and only” product. The new facility supports this vision of Kyokutoh, by involving the social, economical, environmental and cultural agenda. Kyokutoh challenges a new way of thinking of what the manufacturing facility could be, and how the users/workers become more active through a communication. The spiral creates a stream, which converges the accumulative thoughts and experiences of users from which questioning, reasoning, and knowing proceed.
