Site area: 971.06m2
Total floor area: 436.4m2
Architecture office: kitorepe architects
Contractor: Jikuu kenchiku koubou
all photo by Koji Fujii
This is a renovation of a three-story reinforced concrete house built about 25 years ago.
There wasn't much damage to the building, but the time came to change the occupants from parents to children.
The plan required improved insulation and changes to the plan to accommodate the lifestyle.
There are two separate buildings on a large site, each of which houses the parents and the grandmother.
Because it is sandwiched between the two buildings, we needed to create a pathway in the middle of the first floor for the three families to pass through.
We made half of the ground floor into a corridor and a second kitchen/dining room for the three families to use at their leisure.
Next to the second dining room there is a terrace with a nice grape trellis, and the floor is terra cotta for easy access to the terrace.
When a large number of relatives of the three families gather together, they can go back and forth between the terrace and the main house and spend their time in their favorite places in the second dining room.
There was more than enough space for a family of four to live in. Therefore, I think that by creating a second dining room with a necessary pathway, we can define the public area for the three families and increase the privacy of the living area.
The main living space is located on the second floor.
A structural wall of exposed concrete divides the LDK/library space/bedrooms into a rational division, and the children's rooms are located on the third floor.
For families who love to read, the library space is located in the center of the second floor, so that they can pick up a book at any time.
We designed a round dining table and the dining room is by the north window, which is daringly far from the kitchen.
This is also to avoid the dining table being directly under the center of the vaulted ceiling. The reason is that in the center, sound and light gather too much.
In the space with the vaulted ceiling, we can feel the moment when sound and light are surrounded by it.
I felt that it is possible to discover a new flow of time in the midst of the same everyday life as before.
Through this renovation, I wanted to preserve as much as possible the memories of the family who grew up in this building and the traces of its construction as an expression.
I tried to keep as much as possible the surface concrete walls and ceilings, which are not required to be insulated, to retain them.
Traces of the new floor plan and the old one can be felt in the different textures of the ceilings and walls.
We think we can pass on the memories to the children's generation.
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