Japanese architect Jo Nagasaka stripped away the walls of this inherited house in Tokyo, revealing an arrangement of timber columns that give the residence an unfinished visual appeal .
Nagasaka and his company Schemata Architects were asked to refurbish the two-storey house in the city’s Kawaguchi district.The timber-framed residence called House in Hatogaya was the childhood property of the consumer and had recently been inherited from his father – who was the unique designer.
The house was originally subdivided into a tight warren of rooms to fit the maximum number of personal spaces within the layout.
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These have been fitted out with oddities including an arched stained-glass window and a patch of ornamental wooden flooring.
“It was built in the course of the time of social and population development when no one imagined recent social issues such as vacancy resulting from population decline would come up,” said Nagasaka.
To produce a more contemporary living area, partition walls were knocked through and the supporting framework left exposed.
The classic distinctions amongst personal spaces such as bedrooms and living rooms were removed to generate an open-strategy arrangement on the ground floor, in which the master bedroom is open to the kitchen.
“Every area had a various taste, with particular particulars and uniquely shaped windows,” stated the architect. “Accumulation of this kind of robust intentions or love for the home felt a bit as well hefty.”
“In purchase to alleviate such heaviness, we eliminated some of spatial parts, sorted out some elements with common characters and designed a sense of integrity – which is a new kind of really like – we intend to existing in this property.”
The walls were lined in panels of pale timber that reframe the existing windows, even though a section lower by means of the upper floor creates an atrium ignored by two additional bedrooms.
“We punched out a floor of a 2nd-floor area to produce a void connecting all rooms, which had been separated behind closed doors,” explained Nagasaka.
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“The void mediates in between the first floor, the mezzanine, and the second floor, re-configuring spatial relationships all through the house.”
This unfinished aesthetic has become a trademark of the Tokyo-based mostly studio, who earlier this year employed shipping palettes to construct Vitra’s stand at the Salone del Mobile layout fair in Milan. The firm has also not too long ago finished a Tokyo rice shop filled with boxy plywood fittings and an artist’s studio with an indoor backyard.
Photography is by Kenta Hasegawa.
Task credits:
Architect: Jo Nagasaka/Schemata Architects
Collaborator: Reina Sakaguchi
Development: TANK
Floor plans 
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