House Contrast

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House Contrast

Firm

Type

Residential › Private House

YEAR

2009

A
home for a couple and child stands on a lot 3.7 meters wide and 17 meters deep.
Planning of the home focused on how to develop a pleasant layout with
sufficient perspective for this slim lot. The lots to the left and right were
also for sale and of similar breadth and depth. The plan assumed that spacing
between the houses would be tight. Morover, the site is on a grade that rises by
over 2 meters from the street facing. The ground floor where the entrance is
located gradually submerges underground toward the back, where no inlets are
possible.

Square footprints or small lots with
sufficient breadth permit distances and pathways within the plan that can
create spaciousness. But for this lot, the depth of 17 meters could actually create
remoteness between rooms, while the significant difference between breadth and
depth might create a pinched feeling.

The plans considered these issues, and
divided the slim space into three zones: the stairwell in the center, and rooms
on either side of the stairs. The entrance and bath were assigned to the ground
(basement) level, the living and kitchen areas to the main (first) level, and
bedrooms to the upper (second) level. All of the rooms unfold outward from the
stairs. The stairwell has limited openings to the outside, in contrast to the
bright rooms on either side with large openings for natural light. The dark
impression of the stairwell augmented by the finish creates a powerful
contrast, so that the brightly finished rooms practically stand alone. The room
lengths were trimmed to provide better balance with their widths, while the
bright finish and windows peering at walls of the neighboring homes helped to
limit any sense of spatial constraint.

Stowing the sliding doors to the
main-level rooms on either side of the stairs causes the dark stairwell to
vanish and creates the illusion of directly adjoining spaces. Although movement
on the floor between rooms is physically distant, the feel is a much closer
connection. Instead of a single lengthy room and simple perspective on each
floor that would merely emphasize the limited width of the house, connecting
rooms with different characteristics create a sequence, a sense of distance
that amazingly makes the space to the back seem both near and far from the room
where one stands.

The walls and celiling structure to
the stairwell remain exposed for a considerably different quality than the
white-washed walls of the rooms on either side. Shelves are positioned between
the exposed structural members in the stairwell, so that books and objects can
form part of the ambience. The stairwell thus functions as a pathway and a
display of the home owner’s interests. The shelving amidst structure continues
without interruption from ground level to upper level ceiling. The arrangement
adds vertical continuity to the horizontally stretched plan.

Finally, the bath, located deep within
the subground portion of the ground level, is furnished with a lightwell
vaulted to the upper level for the additional benefit of ventilation. The micro
garden in the lightwell is visible from the main level for an additional
vertical connection besides the stairs.

Exterior walls are black to actually
emphasize the slim figure of the house, but the car port, which can tend to be
dank, is finished with white to impart a brighter image.

Product Spec Sheet

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Team

Akira Koyama

Architect

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House Contrast

House Contrast

Product Spec Sheet

Collaborating Firms

Team