Outside In

The project was launched when I was commissioned to enlarge a house for a couple in their 30's and their three daughters living in Yamanashi Prefecture. On my first visit there, I found the houses of one story and two stories both stand close together but that there remain some empty lots, farming fields, wooded areas and unpaved roads. I remember that the bounty and generosity of the place inspired me. My client told me that we would have the opportunity to hear beautiful sound of birds in the early mornings and to see wild pheasants, peafowl and every now and then raccoon dogs. I looked for how the residents here could live in harmony with such nature and climate even in a crowded residential area. In the beginning I destroyed half of the main house, and then designed and built a new, one-storied structure with a continuous gradation from the wooded area located on the south side of the house to the inside area - that is, it is a boundary structure built in space between nature and human beings.

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