Model

Project 2 Submission

Narrative

The solitary man sits in a concrete block gazing at the conservative order through the window. He is no friend of the outdated world, in fact he does not deign to bother as long as his castle stands.


Design Concept

What I want to achieve here is to design a series of spaces for the solitary man who rather stays in his contemporary "Castle" than get involved in what he calls the "outdated world". The site is placed in the traditional residential area of Tokyo, Japan, due to the land limitation the buildings within this area are built right next to each other, which indicates his "Castle" is surrounded by so called "conservative order".

In the painting, the guy appears sitting alone in a rectangular prism made of concrete with large openings on the wall. This is to me, the representation of modernism in contrast to the surrounding obsolete order. Therefore rectangular shapes are intensively adopted in the design symbolizing the contemporary order.

The cube in the drawing below represents the surrounding conservative order where activities are contained as a whole under one single roof. To differentiate from this conservative order, the rooms are separated and sorted according to their functionality. An inner courtyard is bounded in the middle as nature no doubt plays a significant role in every day's life, even for the lonely man. However he only wants to stay in his little world, so bringing the nature into his castle is essential. Based on this idea, the courtyards have been positioned very carefully: large openings are created at both sides facing towards the middle courtyard, so the lonely man can enjoy nature without going out to the conservative world. Another reason for this arrangement is letting the light into the interior spaces, there are also some small openings on the roof designed to serve this purpose. the front courtyard is a more private outdoor space connecting to the living room which also ensure that there is sufficient light in this room.

The contact between the "Castle" and the outside obsolete world is limited, as stated in the narrative, the solitary man does not want to be bothered, his privacy has to be well protected. This is done by only employing opening (entrance) at the front facade following a long narrow corridor to the left and three small windows at the rear facade where the hypocritical man can sit on the roof and observe the outside world if he has to. Basically everything he needs for everyday life is included in his "castle", light, trees, beautiful view of the courtyard...therefore he can comfortably live his life in the way he wants.

Ground Floor Plan 1:100




First Floor Plan 1:100




Section View 1:100




Axonometric 1:200