The site is located within a dense residential
district of Musashino in Tokyo, while there are still large greeneries
remaining at its periphery. When we visited the site fronting
the narrow street and closely surrounded by 2 to 3-stories residences,
it caught our attention that many of the existing houses kept
their window-curtains shut. Given the situations, we began the
project with figuring out how to integrate the new house into
the existing fabric of its neighborhood.
We envision the space through which the house communicates with
the surrounding environment, while simultaneously securing the
enough daylight and natural ventilation by three-dimensionally
distancing the rooms. The slit-glazed intermediate space between
1st and 2nd floor is positioned on a different level from the
windows’ of the neighboring houses, hence the sight lines are
not interfering with each other. Even though the house fully opens
up to the outside, “blindfolding” the windows is no longer necessary
for all. The rooms on the 1st floor have translucent ceilings
obtaining the light from the intermediate space and thus providing
the constant and sufficient daylight to the rooms. On the upper
floor, the slit openings become clerestory windows. The slit-openings
vary its heights in relation to the surroundings, the shortest
at the west side to which manufactured openable windows (the rests
are custom-made-fixed windows) are applied in order to gain natural
ventilation. The parallelogram-shaped plan allows for easy parking
and also orients the house to efficiently receive the south-west
sun light. In terms of the elevation, siding-panels are used throughout
including the handrail portions on the roof terrace, while painted
plaster or stucco surfaces onto wood framings usually cause cracks
due to the lateral movements. The panels, glasses, and wooden
columns were evenly divided and placed in accordance with the
respective standard sizes. Since the house is structured only
with the columns along the exterior walls, it creates an adequate
“three dimensional distance” between the rooms and also fully
opens up the intermediate space. |
|
