The architects of YSLA architects sought to guarantee the family an experience of liberation from city life to connect with nature, feeling the space, breathing the air, and entering the atmosphere of the forest. In Japanese culture, this is known as Shinrin-Yoku, related to the Latin proverb “mens sana in corpore sano”, it is the practice of forest bathing, walking through the forest allows the body and mind to free themselves from stress and improves creativity.
To formalize this premise, the corridor of the house is extended until it embraces the forest. In this way, the limits between interior and exterior are broken, and the forest is understood as an extension of the living room to be able to fully enjoy nature and return to the city with another point of view.
A home around the forest by YSLA architects. Photograph by Munetaka Onodera.
Description of project by YSLA architects
A “Home Around the Forest” is a weekend house in Karuizawa, Japan, for a couple with two children living in central Tokyo. The family was familiar with the area, and they stayed many holidays in hotels nearby. Finally, they decided that they wanted their own hotel room in the forest, a 70sqm suite for a family of four to make the most of their holidays.
In YSLA we wanted to maximize the time quality that the family would spend in the house and for that we proposed them to slow down from the city life and reconnect with nature. We fancy them to feel wider, feel better, to live around the forest, taking in its atmosphere. This will be what in the Japanese culture is known as Shinrin-Yoku, the mindfulness practice of bath forest. It’s known that walking around the forest can upgrade creativity, boost immunity, and diminish stress in other words; it helps you to achieve the Latin proverb “a healthy mind in a healthy body”.
A home around the forest by YSLA architects. Photograph by Munetaka Onodera.
To fulfil this connection, we build a home around the forest, a house in which its corridor extends to the forest and embrace it as an extension. The forest became part of the living room; the line between interior and exterior became non-existent and they can feel wider, feel better. The family can enjoy the totality of its nature, they can walk, run, bike, skate… At the end of their holidays the family can go back to Tokyo feeling they had a healthy, balanced, and full of happy days together.
