Bespoke buildings from modern Japan

Say you want to live in a library, or in the forest, or in a library in the forest, but you would prefer to maintain your high living standards. There is one architecture studio that has the skills and vision to build the house of your dreams: Bow-Wow.

An ongoing exhibition of the Japanese architecture studio Bow-Wow at the Jaroslav Fragner Gallery shows how architecture can maximize limited space while appealing to a client's unique wishes. The exhibition presents 19 very precise house models at the scale of 20:1, as well as perspective plans and videos. The perspective plans are unusual as they are a cross between plan and illustration, with people, flowers and animals depicted. These, combined with the wooden models and black-and-white perspective drawings, give the exhibition a sober, modest feel at first glance. But a closer look at the models reveals the visionary creativity behind Bow-Wow's design.

Bow-Wow's buildings can be classified in two groups. First are houses located in the city, usually built on a small ground plan and therefore oriented vertically. Secondly, the studio creates houses in the countryside and these are horizontal, following the original ground formation and very much connected to the surrounding nature.

Even the architecture studio's use of physical rather than digital models goes against the grain, according to noted Czech architecture historian Zdeněk Lukeš.

"With all the new media used in architecture today, everything is being done on the computer. You can do wonderful and amazing visualizations: flying over the site and then diving in to have a closer look. Architects have ceased to draw and create models. I know some architecture schools don't even teach drawing or modeling anymore. But I believe it is wrong because modeling teaches the architect to think spatially," he said.

Utilizing space

Established by Yoshiharu Tsukamoto and Momoyo Kaijima in Tokyo in 1992, Bow-Wow approaches architecture like a tailor approaches a suit: They make buildings that perfectly appeal to specific human demands as well as the place in which they are built. Contemporary cities all around the world face the same lack of space. Bow-Wow utilizes the small spaces between buildings, creating efficient designs without a superfluous centimeter.

Bow-Wow's approach to architecture is quite the opposite of what early 20th-century European modernists like Le Corbusier had in mind when planning the strictly rational city for millions of inhabitants. His ideal of mass production was meant to be the perfect solution for the upcoming era. However, life in cities built according to these once-radical thoughts is slowly dying.

Visitors to the exhibition can see several of Bow-Wow's response to Le Corbusier: A seven-story house Bow-Wow built for their studio is one continuous space on several levels where the inhabitant can be constantly aware of the whole space around him. Another house built in Tokyo for two journalists features a significant book collection. Another design, the "Double Chimney House," is basically a house cut in two.

Each of Bow-Wow's buildings is unique, and therefore it is difficult to define the studio's style, according to Osamu Okamura, architect and editor-in-chief of architecture magazine ERA 21.

"Using space as efficiently as possible is typical for their designs. There is a big tradition of such building in Japan, and architecture by Bow-Wow takes it almost to perfection," he said.  

Despite Bow-Wow's rather radical approach to form and design, the studio maintains some ties to traditional Japanese architectural traditions, especially the concept of flexibility of space, Okamura said.

"Flexibility is something very natural to Japanese architecture. They can have one room where they sleep, eat, work and exercise. They take out a mattress, table, mat or whatever is needed at the moment. In Europe, you have one room to sleep in, and for most of the day the space is quite wasted. In Europe, we allow ourselves spatial luxury, but can we still afford it?"

Bow-Wow provides a contemporary Japanese point of view on architecture and its connection to tradition, while offering ideas that can be applied across the globe. This will certainly be one of the best architecture exhibitions in Prague this year.

Filip Šenk can be reached at
fsenk@praguepost.com