Hotakubo Housinga housing complex in the city of Kumamoto, is the first work of the Japanese architect Riken Yamamoto. The housing units offer a glimpse of how the winner of the Pritzker Architecture Prize 2024 sees the social nature of architecture. In March of this year, Yamamoto, 79, a visiting professor at the Tokyo University of the Arts, won the world’s highest award in recognition of the social nature of his architecture, which focuses not only on building design but also in the creation of local spaces. communities.
Three futuristic five-story buildings with exposed concrete exteriors, arched roofs, and silver railings and stairs surround a U-shaped courtyard from the east, west, and north. The patio, in front of the terraces of all units, is a private space for residents that can only be accessed from the south side of the assembly hall building or passing through each unit.
Hotakubo Housing It was completed in 1991 and was the first housing complex built under the project Kumamoto Artpolis from Kumamoto Prefecture. There are a total of 110 units, of which 89 are currently occupied. A president of the neighborhood association showed me the house. The company employee, 67, said he has lived here with his wife since its completion.
The house has several floor types. One offers the distinctive feature of an entrance side separated by an exterior corridor called a “bridge,” which links the dining and kitchen areas. The dining room and kitchen have glass walls on both sides. The unit has spaces that respect privacy, such as a bedroom, as well as a space open to the common area of the home. In addition, it has a communal terrace, which can be accessed via stairs from the patio.
Initially, the unique structure sparked criticism. “Some residents were perplexed because their rooms were visible from the units across the courtyard or from common areas,” the president recalled. “However, we could often see the children playing in the yard.”
Postwar Japanese housing complexes often adopted the European style, which emphasized privacy. Yamamoto viewed these exclusive dwellings as an inherent contradiction, as they bring people together but do not create a community. The distinctive shape of Hotakubo Housing It was his challenge to this contradiction, through design.
After being named Pritzker laureate, Yamamoto said: “We don’t just design buildings. We also design the way people meet. This is the responsibility of an architect. That’s what I tried to do with Hotakubo Housing”. Yamamoto has designed many housing complexes both in Japan and abroad, while repeatedly devising ways to connect public and private spaces.
His attempts originated from field studies carried out in settlements in various parts of the world, when he was young. Yamamoto realized that all houses exist in a community, not in isolation. This experience led him to think about the relationship of the home with the surrounding community.
Amid Japan’s low birth rate, aging population and serious problem of solitary deaths, Yamamoto is an advocate for “local community areas.” They offer a way for people to live together and help each other, rather than a family living in one house. They provide lifestyle support in terms of livelihood support, energy supply and demand systems and local economy.
However, there are some barriers to realizing this ideal. Yamamoto proposed creating a garden in the common areas of public housing to stimulate interactions between residents. The idea was successful in South Korea, but in Japan it was hampered by management problems.
“Based on his settlement studies, Yamamoto has deepened his thinking about families and communities, and encouraged people’s behavior through spatial design,” said the professor. Taro Igarashi, critic at Tohoku University. “The award is also a recognition of his attitude of believing in the power of architecture to engage society”.
* The author of this article is an editor of the Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun
Source: The Washington Post
[Fotos: The Japan News; Eugene Ohiko/AP]
