House in Mt. Fuji (Forest Refuge)
- location
- Narusawa, Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan
- function
- villa (guest-house)
- size
- 138.65 sqm.
- structure
- wooden construction
- completion
- 2000
- credits:
- architect
- Satoshi Okada
- project team
- Lisa Tomiyama
Eisuke Aida - structural designer
- Kenta Masaki
- general contractor
- Ide Kogyo Co. Ltd.
- photo credit:
- Satoshi Okada architects & Katsuhisa Kida
-
The house is a weekend villa for inviting guests. The site is situated among the plantation of broadleaf trees in the northern foothills of Mt. Fuji, 1200m above sea level. Its ground, molded out of lava flows back in antiquity, undulates to a great extent in the east-west direction, inclining gently with a mean gradient of approximately 1/10 from southwest to northeast. It is extending from northeast to southwest, facing two roads on its northeastern and southeastern boundaries respectively. On the premises are a number of deciduous trees such as Japanese beech or magnolia. A forest of white birch extends towards north. Peace and calm reign over the area, only to be broken by an adjacent log-house on the west.
The client requested to build a small house in order to appreciate its surrounding nature. In the site, the building was brought closer to the northwestern boundary, offering a pleasant sight filled with sunlight, trees, along with a panoramic rise and fall of the land stretching out to the southeast, and also shielding as much as possible the daily sight of the neighboring log-house on the west.
The house volume is divided into two realms by a diagonally folded wall. One is a big space of living for accommodating guests; the other is for private bedrooms with a bathroom. In the living, its ceiling height is gradually coming down from 5.3m (max.) to 3.8m (min.) in accordance with the sloping roof. Beneath the loft, dining and kitchen are placed as a compressed space with 2.0m ceiling height. The entrance is enough dark to appreciate the skylight down on the living. From entrance towards living, one goes through a tall and narrow, but dim space; then, gradually reaches the taller, broader and lighter space along the folded wall. In the hall connecting to bedrooms, it represents the space of the latter half of a day. The end narrow portion has a small window beneath the ceiling, from which the afternoon sunlight pierces on the opposite white wall to turn its color into orange. On the exterior in particular, along the folded wall, the sloping roof is to accord with the gradient of terrain silhouette viewing from the southeast roads in order to control the building scale in the landscape at sight.
The structure consists of a wood-frame construction. The folded wall is effective against wind loads to the huge wall of the living. Water section, a small box extruded from the main body because of its high humidity, structurally anchors the hall, the tall void beside. The outer wall is made of Japanese cedar stained in black, the color of lava, for the memory of the site.
In the landscape of between leaves above and turfs bottom, the villa stands like a ground upheaval of the site, where the black lava has slept since the ancient times. It also provides a dark band between the greens, where the blackness represents “a shadow in the forest.”
Text by Satoshi Okada
- publications
-
Guest House, Edzioni Press, New York, 2005, pp. 226-233.
Living Plans, New Concepts for Advanced Housing, Birkhauser, Germany, 2005, pp. 62-63, cover page.
New Country House, Laurence King Publishing, UK, 2005, pp. 36-41.
Today's Country Houses, Links International, Spain, 2004, pp. 68-74.
Atlas of Contemporary World Architecture, Phaidon Press, UK, 2004, p.165.
Case di Vacanza, Federico Motta Editore, Italy, 2003, pp. 291-303.
Within Small Homes, Pageone Publishing, Singapore, 2003, pp. 176-191.
Mini House, Pageone Publishing Pte Ltd., Singapore, 2003, pp. 46-51.
Dream Houses, Pace Publishing, Hong Kong, 2002, pp. 164-173.
20 architetti per Venti Case, Electa, Italy, 2002, pp. 156-167, cover page.
45 under 45 Young Architecture, Verlag Anton Pustet, Austria, 2002, pp. 44-47.
100 of the World Best Houses, IMAGES, Australia, 2002, pp. 158-161.
Country Modern, Loft Publications, Spain, 2002, pp. 120-129, cover page.
Grand Designs, 032, England, Oct. 2006, pp. 94-97.
DOMES, vol. 46, Domes Architectural Review, Greek, Jun. 2006，pp. 92-99.
Dwell Magazine, July, USA, Jul./Aug., 2004, pp. 112-113.
Interior World Magazine, vol. 26, iwm, Taiwan, Jul. 2002, pp. 62-77.
Ville Giardini, vol. 377, Elemond, Italy, Feb. 2002, pp. 16-27.
Four Rooms, Salon Press, Russia, Feb. 2001, pp. 94-99.
Monitor, Monitor Magazine, Russia, Jan. 2001, pp. 92-95.
Abstract - The Best of International Architecture, vol. 6/7, Anton Publishing, Belgium, Apr./May, 2001, pp. 16-25.
Architectura Viva, Monograph Magazine, Spain, Jul./ Aug., 2001, pp. 76-79.
Casabella, vol. 688, Electa, Italy, Apr. 2001, pp. 20-25.
Baumeister, Germany, Dec. 2000, pp. 28-29, 62-67.
md international magazine of design, Koneadin Verlag, Germany, Dec. 2000, pp. 86-89.
The Architectural Review, The Architectural Review, England, Jul. 2000, pp. 73-75.
