By Nigel F. Maynard

Project: House in Minohshinmachi / Location: Osaka, Japan / Architect: Yasuyuki Kitamura Architects / Photos: Masashige Akeda

This house is a study in the idea that it is possible to build a beautiful, interesting house that is also economical, its designer, Yasuyuki Kitamura Architects, says.

Located in Osaka, Japan, the site played an important role in the project. Its location in the northernmost part of Minoh City, the site is blessed by the natural environment, though many of the houses built in the surrounding area were not much different from those built in the city center. In this environment, a young couple asked Yasuyuki Kitamura for a simple house that would allow them to absorb the richness of nature in their daily life, unlike living in a house built in the city.

The south side of the site faces the road, and the east and west sides are flanked by residential lots. On the north side, the site faces the management road of Satoyama Farm, which was established as a buffer zone for the landslide disaster warning area. The background features the magnificent greenery of Mount Aogai, the northernmost mountain in Minoh City. Kitamura felt that a quiet residence with a vague boundary between interior and exterior and in harmony with the surrounding natural environment was the best way to address this border between the “city” and “nature.”

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The one-story building has a simple, loosely gabled roof whose volume is kept low so that it is loosely continuous with the surrounding landscape. And because of the “very limited” construction budget, the architect called for the structure to be built using conventional wooden construction methods, with structural pillars measuring roughly 4 inches square. “A simple symmetrical frame structure with columns spaced one pitch apart, a single longitudinal climbing beam inside and outside, and rafters with narrowed ends are used to ensure high seismic performance and to significantly reduce the construction period,” the architect says.

The interior space features paired openings, a light roof, deep eaves and large skylights that draw in the trees and blue sky. And by nesting the rooms, the design created an intermediate area, blurring the interior and exterior of the building. Two pillars placed in the center of the large space, positioned as architectural components with a small cross section, provide the space with a sense of calm, like standing trees in a forest, Kitamura says.

This single architectural gesture establishes the building’s style based on an honest use of materials and a balance between opacity and transparency. Inside the single-story home, the kitchen, bath and other functions are contained by a number of nested rectilinear volumes, either white-washed or clad in plywood. Modern and solid, the structures provide a contrast against the classic, airy envelope. While seemingly light and ethereal, the house is highly earthquake-resistant, thanks to the traditional wooden construction method employed in its making. A new expression in a remarkable setting, the project shows that greatness can be achieved with modest means, the architect says.

The architect says that in recent years the demand for housing performance has steadily increased in the country, partly because of seismic activity and other natural disasters. This building was designed to meet earthquake resistance grade 3 standards, and with excellent insulation performance standards, resulting in a calm and quiet atmosphere for the homeowners.

“We have been searching for the future of environmental architecture, and our goal was to reconstruct the forgotten relationship between local character and the surrounding natural environment,” the firm says. “The result is a new type of building that, in addition to its high residential performance, feels more like a part of nature than a landscape.”