Architecture Design History - Kenga Kuma - House of Plastic (japan)

Kenga Kuma - House of Plastic (Japan)

House of Plastic (2002), allocated in Tokyo the capital city of Japan is designed by Kengo Kuma, an award winning architecture who crafted numerous residential works, museums, and other public facilities. Kengo Kuma have received on-going critical acclaim and earned several awards from national to international, including the prestigious Architectural Institute of Japan Award in 1997. Furthermore, he is a professor at Keio University's Faculty of Science and Technology and lectures at other institutions. Not only an architecture himself, he is the author of five books including the best selling New Introduction to Architecture; 1994. Kengo Kuma is considered a leading lecturer and writer on contemporary Japanese architectural theory

Kengo Kuma wants to emphasize his philosophy in relation of avoiding the use from the massiveness of the concrete box. "If I were to describe the architecture of the 20th century with one word, it would be concrete," he said (Botond Bognar 2005, Page D1.2, http://www.architectureweek.com/2005/0914/design_1-1.html). The essence was for him to approach the use of natural materials to achieve an airy, open spaces filled with sunlight. He believed the methods for creating architecture must be flexible and open; the structure must be friendly towards the human body. Everything must be light and gentle, starting from planning the structure and ventilation system up to designing of the way light flows through the building. These principles are complete opposite of what concrete building stands for. With Kengo's beliefs architecture finally fuses and becomes one with the nature.

(Kengo Kuma & Associates, Page 2, http://www.valdofusi.it/ita/bando/pdf/KengoKuma.pdf)

(Azby Brown, page 1, http://int.kateigaho.com/mar04/architect-kuma.html)

He deems with the broad variety of modern materials valid today we should not allow it to mislead us. Just like the name of this creative form of art, his recent work House of Plastic built in the centre of Tokyo is mainly constructed with plastic as its main theme. Hence its features are very similar to the two materials commonly found in traditional Japanese architecture, bamboo and rice paper. Much of its overall outline is a direct response to sunlight maximizing building codes; in addition it is situated very close to its neighbours in a typical standard urban Japanese fashion. The two storey residential includes a basement featuring a photo studio and an open air studio on the flat roof which has an overview of the city. Large areas of the house have the characteristics of glazing on the ground floor; however the building is largely made of FRP (Fibreglass- reinforced polymer) as a result of achieving the desired outcome of lightness and openness. Translucent, golden green fiberglass