Tag: japan

• MOMO TOKYO

  

  Last summer, photographer Parker Woods spent two weeks walking over 100 miles in Tokyo with a peach-colored (”momo” in Japanese) backdrop and a metal c-stand. He used this accessory to “contextualize his first encounter with Japanese culture.”

  In some cases, it functions as you would expect: as a backdrop for the new people that he encountered along his walking journey. 

  But in other cases, the backdrop is simply inserted into the urban environment. Sometimes rolled up amongst a pile of metal tubes. And sometimes fully erected in the middle of a busy road.

  This is an interesting photography project based in one of my favorite cities in the world, and so I wanted to share it on the blog. All of his photos were shot on Kodak film. It’s also giving me some ideas for my own photos.

  If you’d like to buy a copy of the book ($40), you can do that here. There’s a limited run of only 250 copies. If you’d like to read a bit more about the project (and see a few additional photos), you can do that here on VSCO.

  Image: Parker Woods

  2017.06.11

• Peach skin

  I am fascinated by the way the Japanese think about housing. It is very different than the way we think about housing here in North America. Below is a small house tour that reinforces that. If you can’t see it below, click here.

  [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fEeh-8OFT8?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

  2017.03.27

• Japan Unlayered

  

  If you happen to find yourself in Vancouver between January 27th and February 28th, you may want to check out an exhibition being held at the Fairmont Pacific Rim called Japan Unlayered. 

  It is a celebration of Japanese architecture, design, and culture, curated by the Japanese architect Kengo Kuma and developers Westbank and Peterson.

  The exhibition is in support of a new project in Vancouver by Kengo Kuma called 1550 Alberni. Pictured above. It will be his first in North America. 

  The architecture is a 43-storey (residential) tower formed by two “scoops” that carve out the building in response to its urban context. Some of those relationships start to become apparent when you see the building rendered into the skyline (below toward right).

  

  I’ll be in Vancouver next month and so I’m hoping to stop by.

  2017.01.27

• Nest or cave?

  I was recently introduced to the work and writing of Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto. One concept that he writes about that I really like is the idea of nest vs. cave.

  The way Fujimoto describes a cave is that it’s a naturally occurring and pre-existing condition. It is exists independent of humans. So if and when a human decides to occupy a cave, he or she must assimilate their lives to that which is already there. They have to deal with the ambiguity of the spaces because it is not clear how everything should be used.

  A nest, on the other hand, is something completely created by and for the benefit of a person or animal. It would not exist without someone creating it and so it is prescriptive and functional in a way that a cave is not.

  Fujimoto is interested in exploring architecture that is analogous to caves. Which is why he designs houses like this one (House NA) in Tokyo:

  

  In most countries, a house like this would not meet code and would be illegal. But in Tokyo it’s obviously allowed. And his hope is that the owners will discover new and unintended ways to interact with the unusual pairing of levels and platforms.

  However, I think about this juxtaposition differently – likely incorrectly in the mind of Fujimoto.

  I’m actually more interested in nests. Because in a way, mass produced housing is like a cave. It exists whether or not we decide to occupy it. And it is generally created to appeal to lots of people, rather than to the idiosyncratic tastes of one person. So when someone does occupy it, they invariably end up trying to shape it.

  But not to the extent of a nest. A nest is custom. It is what you would build for yourself given the opportunity to do so. And that thought is really appealing to me. Maybe it’s because I don’t like the ambiguity of a cave. That could be a possibility.

  I could also be thinking about it differently because I tend to think of Japanese homes as being quite individualistic. Since Japanese people generally don’t care about resale value, they don’t have the same fixation with marketability and future value. That means they’re more likely to just build what they want.

  I’d love to have my own nest.

  Image: Wall Street Journal

  2016.04.22

• Global home prices at the end of 2015

  Seeing how we’ve started looking at data from last year, I thought it would be interesting to look at global home prices as of Q4 2015. Here’s a chart from Knight Frank, which they refer to as their Global House Price Index:

  

  At the top of the list is Turkey, with an 18.4% increase from Q4 2014 to Q4 2015. (Supposedly this is because it has recently become easier for foreigners to buy property in the country.) Canada is 13th with a 6.2% increase (during this same time period) and the United States is 17th at 5.4%.

  This is obviously a high level analysis. There are lots of regional and local variations within each country. For instance in Canada right now, Calgary is a very different place than, say, Vancouver or Toronto.

  Nonetheless, it’s still valuable to see the relative performance of each country and see what their (Knight Frank’s) prediction is for 2016:

  “Our outlook for 2016 is muted. We expect the index’s overall rate of growth to be weaker in 2016 than 2015. The global economy is experiencing a potentially dangerous cocktail of low oil prices, a strong [US] dollar and a continued slowdown in China.”

  It’s also interesting to see how the countries rank in terms of affordability:

  

  Once again, Canada ranks as being one of the least affordable countries in terms of home prices.

  2016.03.09

• The search for perfection

  Two of my favorite things are snowboarding and cities. 

  So the 4K GoPro video below, called Japan Snow – The Search for Perfection, really does it for me. 

  The video is the journey of two GoPro athletes as they go from Tokyo to Hakuba (a village near Nagano, host of the 1998 Winter Olympics) to the northern island of Hokkaido in search of untracked powder. If you’re a snowboarder or skier, you’ll of course appreciate that journey.

  For you urbanists, the city shots are incredible. I also love how they describe Tokyo as a “sophisticated web of innovation and tradition.” I often describe Tokyo in a similar way, but I like their wording better.

  Make sure you full screen this video and turn on your sound. It’s about 14 minutes short. Enjoy.

  [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXpXHoDKL64?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

  2016.01.09

• Japan’s disposable housing

  

  https://500px.com/embed.js

  As further evidence that real estate is a local business, let’s take a look at the housing market in Japan today. It’s a very unique market.

  According to this Freakonomics podcast, 50% of all single family houses in Japan are demolished by the time they reach 38 years old. That’s their half-life. By contrast, in the US, this number is 100 years.

  The reason for this is rapid depreciation. Real property typically consists of two things: land and the building. Land doesn’t depreciate. But the structure sitting on the land does.

  In Japan, the building or structure is thought to be fully depreciated (and therefore worth nothing) after about 30 years for a single-family home and after about 40 years for an apartment/condominium.

  The result is that there’s virtually no resale housing market. When somebody buys a house, it is usually torn down and completely rebuilt. It’s a uniquely Japanese phenomenon.

  So why does this happen?

  The Freakonomics podcast presents a couple of hypothesis. Some believe that it’s caused by a Japanese fixation with newness. New is seen as pure and clean. 

  Others believe that it has to do with a building code that is constantly changing due to the high frequency of earthquakes in Japan. 20% of the world’s earthquakes with a magnitude of 6.0 or greater happen in Japan. And so there appears to be a belief that newer homes – with the latest seismic technologies – are the safest.

  Whatever the case may be, the fact that there’s virtually no resale housing market in Japan, not surprisingly, produces some interesting outcomes. For one, maintenance and DIY home projects are uncommon. Why invest in your home when it’s not viewed as an asset, but as a disposable good?

  At the same time, people worry very little about marketability when they are building new. And this is a big reason why Japan is so famous for its radically designed homes. When you’re building only for yourself, you just do what you want.

  But most importantly, some (such as Richard Koo, who is interviewed in the podcast) believe that this approach to housing is a huge “obstacle to affluence.” Without a functioning resale market, the Japanese don’t get the opportunity to build wealth/equity in the same way that other countries do.

  Do you buy that?

  2015.08.24

• 47.55 square meters in Tokyo

  I’ve always been fascinated by Japanese culture.

  A lot of that has to do with how design and technology seem to permeate the culture. But it also has to do with how dichotomous the culture feels to me. On the one hand they’re at the forefront of design and technology, and on the other hand they are very much steeped in tradition. It has always felt like a unique and special place to me.

  So today on ATC I thought I would share a piece of Japanese architecture that I found on Dezeen. It’s a 47.55 square meter (512 square foot) apartment in Tokyo that was recently renovated by Yuichi Yoshida & Associates. 

  Here are three views of the main living area:

  

  

  

  Here’s the view from the main entrance:

  

  Here’s the walk-in-closet/storage area (notice how the exposed concrete walls have been dabbed with plaster):

  

  And here’s the floor plan (I’m guessing sub entrance means secondary entrance):

  

  The first thing that struck me was the lack of a traditional bedroom. It’s basically a nook with a bed and sliding doors. But that was obviously done to give more space to the remainder of the apartment and the main living area, which they label as the “reception area.” The idea was that this space could be used for both living and working, and so they wanted a large open space.

  The other thing that stood out for me was the amount of storage and shelving throughout the apartment. There’s a bookshelf as you walk in. There are drawers under the bed. There’s a walk-in-closet with floor to ceiling shelving. And if you look closely at the upper track for the sliding bedroom doors, you’ll see a small ledge that was purposefully created for storage and display.

  It all seems very Japanese to me.

  It’s a small space and yet there’s no absolutely zero clutter. I love how organized everything seems. For many of you, this space may be a bit too sparse (even with that hammock!). But there’s something really nice about the simplicity of it all. It’s peaceful.

  Images: Katsumi Hirabayashi via Dezeen

  2014.12.03

• How does your city address its streets — literally?

  

  Depending on where you live, street numbering may not be something you’ve given a lot of thought to. In Canada, and in many other places in the world, the convention is usually to start on one end of the street and count up – with even numbers on one side and odd numbers on the other.

  In many cities in the US, they’re even more rational. The streets themselves are numbered and the addresses indicate location. For example in Philadelphia, where I used to live, if you were going to let’s say 1750 Walnut Street, you would know that it’s between the cross streets of 17th Street and 18th Street. It’s a kind of hyper-rational approach, which lets you know precisely the number of blocks you need to go to get to your destination.

  But not all countries and cities are this rational.

  According to this Economist article – which a friend of mine forwarded me over the weekend – Costa Rica actually had no street numbering system until about 2012. Which means that directions were all based on landmarks: “100 metres south of the McDonald’s.” It seems almost hard to believe. But I guess that’s why ¼ of all mail was getting lost.

  Of course, there are also lots of variations in between these two extremes.

  Japan numbers its buildings, but they’re often clustered together in blocks and have no particular order or logic to them. Brasilia (Brazil) also assigns numbers based on sectors, quadrants, and blocks. And in Ireland, where I also used to live, they actually never adopted postal/zip codes. They’re one of the few developed countries in the world not to do that – though it’s coming next year.

  If your city or country has a unique numbering system or you’ve come across one in your travels, I would love to hear from you in the comment section below.

  There are obviously practical reasons to adopt an easy to understand numbering system. People need to be able to figure out where they’re going. But I would also imagine that there are spatial implications to the way you number and the way you organize your city.

  Image: Flickr

  2014.09.29

• Mjölk

  I first heard about Mjölk a few years ago. Located in the Junction, it’s a gorgeous gallery & store dedicated to Scandinavian and Japanese craftsmanship. It has everything from furniture to hand crafts. It’s well worth a visit if you’re into clean lines and the “pure aesthetic of the north.”

  Started by a husband and wife duo, the couple also own the building and live above the store. They recently renovated their home and it was just awarded a 2013 Toronto Urban Design Award. You can see all the photos here. I particularly like the third floor inner courtyard:

  

  If you’re curious as to what brought them to the Junction, check out this response from a Dwell interview dated 2011:

  “Downtown became so expensive, and that pushed people either east or west. In the past five years, this area has really become a destination. A lot of young, independent businesses have popped up, starting with reclamation stores Smash and Post and Beam. There’s also Crema Coffee Co., Pandemonium Books & Discs, Junction Fromagerie (a Quebecois cheese shop), and Bunner’s gluten-free vegan bakery, to name a few.”

  I like to think of residential properties as a leading indicator for gentrification. Sometimes it’s easy to miss the change taking place behind closed doors though.

   

  2013.10.08