房子丨日本丨KamakuraStudio

Architects:KamakuraStudio

Area:168m²

Year:2022

Photographs:Koji Fujii (Torel),Shinkenchiku-sha,KeisukeFukui (KamakuraStudio)

Lead Architect:Keisuke Fukui, Keisuke Morikawa

Design Team:Keisuke Fukui

Technical Team:Keisuke Morikawa

Country:Japan

Text description provided by the architects. This project serves as both the architect's residence and office. By making the first-floor office a space where people from the neighborhood can casually drop by, it aims to foster connections within the community. The site is located in a relatively new neighborhood, where 75% of the residents have moved in within the past decade. In the future, this area may face challenges such as population decline and an aging society. Hoping to avoid repeating the trajectory of past "new towns," the architect believes the key to a sustainable community lies in residents continually thinking about their city as an extension of their daily lives.

The first floor features an office that also functions as an open space for the local community.• Brewing extra coffee and sharing it with neighbors creates a café-like atmosphere.• Filling a large bookshelf with books donated by nearby residents makes it feel like a library.• Watching a film together on a projector turns the space into a makeshift movie theater.

By stacking these small ideas—"extending daily life just a little"—the project seeks to gently nurture connections between residents and the neighborhood. So that people feel they are "sharing something together whether they're inside or outside," materials, architectural elements, and floor levels are treated continuously, softening the boundary between indoors and outdoors. This seamless connection helps bring people closer, both spatially and socially.

In this area, a "plant-sharing network," originally started among a few neighbors, has expanded to dozens of households. Such proactive participation demonstrates the neighborhood's vitality. In response, this project's façade features a three-dimensional planting strategy. The first floor is an open space directly connected to the street, while from the second floor upward, plants propagated through this network occupy a diagonal opening that allows southern sunlight to pass through. In both plan and section, terraces and interior rooms alternate, creating a lush environment reminiscent of living amid forest trees.

By sharing spaces and everyday pleasures in this way, the architect aims to gradually build gentle, fulfilling relationships. They believe that "sharing daily life as an engaged participant" ultimately forms the foundation for sustaining a vibrant urban community.

Since the completion of this building, it has hosted a variety of events, including cafés, lectures, workshops, and film screenings—activities that have generated multiple networks and begun influencing other locations as well. More communities have reached out with comments like, "We want our ground floor to be like this building," or "We'd love to implement this concept elsewhere," indicating a growing interest in similar endeavors.

Small-scale, everyday activities are gradually intersecting, illuminating a future where a diverse range of people in the neighborhood connect more naturally. It will be exciting to see what kinds of new interactions and initiatives take root here and how far their influence may spread.

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