In the downtown area of Osaka City, many projects are underway to rebuild small old wooden houses into high-rise condominiums. Cities are becoming safer and more efficient, but more inorganic and homogeneous. A couple of clients and his mother lived in a wooden building where offices, warehouses and dwellings coexist, and have long run a cosmetics company here. However, the patchwork building had many structural problems and was not a comfortable place to live in old age, so they decided to demolish it and build a new one.
We have discussed many times about the size of each space, how to connect it, and how to partition it. As a result, we created a one-story floor plan that meets all the requirements, installed it on a narrow site, and covered it with a simple triangular roof. Daylight was taken from the skylight. By extending the roof and firewall towards the road, the visibility of the office has been improved and the entrance has become a semi-outdoor multipurpose space.
A small one-story house built on a narrow site is compact and easy to use, just like a tool box. In a city lined with high-rise condominiums, it may be more luxurious to live in contact with the ground.