Joe Chikamori from 07BEACH office has designed a house in a quiet residential area in northern Kyoto city in Japan for a couple and their three children.
Location
Kyoto, Japan
Photo
Yosuke Ohtake
Editor
Ha Thu Pham
After various plannings, the house was designed as one big space, placing the double-height living room at the centre, as the owners of the house preferred a simple and open plan and also they must keep eyes on their three children, with this design they can see where and who does what.
The house consists of a car park at the front, inner rooms and a courtyard in terms of daylighting. Joe designed the layout of the house for several reasons: “the space left was hardly enough for a garden at the back side of the site and there are neighbours’ walls blocking closely even if the windows are opened on the outer walls.”
Because the courtyard enclosed with glazed walls in a limited width of the site makes the left space tight so he thought of an indoor tree that is as if drawing a courtyard into the room inside.
“It is expected that the tree which will grow close to three children will strengthen the relationship between the family and the house as if the tree is another member of the family”, said Joe.
The finishings were chosen in the balance between the modern structure of the house and traditional Japanese style from the husband’s preference.
The bathroom was placed in the middle of the house facing the living room so that the husband who likes taking bath above all could enjoy it with his children like an open-air bath, overlooking the trees. Although a curtain-rail was set in the bathroom just in case, even after a few months of living in, it seems that the family got used to the exposed bathroom as they are still using it without a curtain.
It is like the character of the residents and the house got very close now after a lot of time-consuming discussions, designing back and forth.
Renovation plans
