Archisteem 34: Friendly Architecture Curation

Today's curated project: Tree-ness House

Let me get back to my favourite residential project curation before I change it to another type of project for the next month. I always love to visit different house and to understand how people decorate their house. It led me to learn about others lifestyle and way of thinking. With the accumulation of that, I could anticipate different design solutions and able to deliver a more matured and ideal design for my client as well as for my own use.

This residential individual house project is led by Akihisa Hirata a Japanese architect firm and took place in Toshima, Japan. The project covered an approximate 331.38m² of 4 1/2 stories individual house unit and was completed in 2017.

On the first sight, this is a very unique housing project which I only can find a few alike in Japan. Their modern architectural style for housing likes to play with boxes of space protruding out from the main building block, creating different pocket spaces that connect with the surrounding context.

For this project, the concept of the house is based on one tree that organically integrated with a combination of characteristics like the truck, branch and leaf which gave birth to the odd form of the house. However, we can observe a clear hierarchy of space through the front elevation of the house which resembles a tree very much.

Each of the concrete boxes that are stacked on the main structure has openings and fitted with plants. It is to create a sense of place whereby even a small space like that can bring the feel of nature to the resident. By turning the boxes into terraces and gardens, from the exterior we see this feature as the ‘leaf’ of the whole ecosystem.

On the other hand, inside the ‘branch’ and ‘trunk’, there lie the more private spaces like bedrooms, living room and dining room. Each of the interior spaces holds a unique function and equipped with different kind of openings toward the surrounding. There are more openings when the resident get to the upper floors too.

Ultimately, I would say this house is very experimental and adventurous. The spaces may seemed chaotic outside, but each room has its designated level, finishing and a solid reason behind for being design that way. This is the reason why I emphasize to understand the client before executing the design. However, as a designer, we also need the respect of our decision from the client, so that we could deliver what we are paid for. From our point of view, designers also hope to create spaces that could really benefit the life of the client. I always admire how Japanese respected the professionals which I hope this culture can be cultivated in other countries as well.