House in Karuizawa

This is a small house for a family of three in Karuizawa, Nagano, Japan.

As there is an abundant forest and pure water stream to the east side of the site, this house is open to the forest.

The space has vertical advantage with its 6,370-millimeter square plan and either 1.5 or double floor height voids.

Taking advantage of this height, the walls are decorated with artworks from the client’s collection, and there is a ceiling mounted clothes airer which can be raised and lowered by manually operated winch.

For external finish, we tried not to use materials normally used for residence. Instead, materials such as slate, polycarbonate corrugated sheets, iron pipes for gas are used as much as possible. The idea was that we wanted to make continuation between this new house and the landscape with farm structures used to belong to this particular site.

The client and his family wish to be close to the pristine nature. So, part of the house that would be the most important for the family would be the balcony. Here, plywood sandwich beams are incorporated and arranged in a cross shape to achieve a dynamic cantilever.

As the climate in Karuizawa is rather harsh, for the outer circumference, we developed a weather-proof curtain with a textile designer.

By adding a translucent filter, the landscape becomes abstracted, so that the people inside will be blurred.