House in Nipponbashi

This house was built on an extremely small plot of land in downtown Osaka. Measuring 2.5m, the facade of the building fills the entire front of the site. The house is 13m deep, and as for the lower three floors ceiling heights were kept as low as possible. This construction is topped by the upmost floor, where the dining room is located. With a 6m-high ceiling, the dining room occupies as much as two-thirds of the entire building plan; the remaining third of the depth is filled by a terrace as an open-air space. As a result, the entire structure reverberates the depth of the small-breasted site, as well as emphasizes the vertical direction. The building features two main topics. One is the verticality of urban life. The other one is the creation of a floating living space the top floor, separated from the din of the street and close to Nature. For all this, no more was needed than a few square meters of terrace space and about 30 square meters of building space, including the generous dining room. What I tried to do in designing this house was to give new meaning to the concept of a rooftop garden.The building at once provides the sensation of a privileged view and a unique feeling of being afloat. This, I think, is the precious quality that would not be without the modern concept of space, or more specifically: the rooftop garden.

I do not know whether this house with it's tiny terrace and dining room merits the epithet of modern architecture. However, I am convinced that there is one thing we need to avoid at any rate: to be blind to what our age has brought about.