KAIT Kobo - Kanagawa Institute of Technology, in DETAIL
13/06/2011.
by junya.ishigami+associates [Kanagawa] Japan
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
The structure presents another round in the architect’s ongoing contest with gravity. The forest comprises 305 slender steel 5m-high columns, irregularly orientated and distributed throughout the space, while the field from which they rise is a distorted square bed of concrete, 47m by 46m, slightly raised above the surrounding bitumen. A flat roof caps the space with linear roof lights, and a frameless glass perimeter seals it. The architecture ends there; its animation then takes over with furniture, pot plants and people.
Ishigami explains the evolution of the design as a painstaking investigation of the relationships between the columns – a task for which he developed custom-made software.
"I wanted to make a space with very ambiguous borderlines, which has a fluctuation between local spaces and the overall space, rather than a universal space like that of Mies" says Ishigami. "This allows a new flexibility to emerge, revealing reality rather than shaping it."
Junya Ishigami, born in Tokyo, Japan (1974). Education:
1994 - 1998 Musashi Institute of Technology.
1998 - 2000 Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music.
Professional experience:
2000 - 2004 Kazuyo Sejima + Associates.
In 2004 he set up his own firm, "Junya Ishigami + Associates". Junya Ishigami questions common understanding of architecture. This allows him to create things beyond trends, established principles and definitions, develop new structures, new spaces and organize the environment differently. He hopes his projects will be able to change the lifestyle of modern architecture radically and fill it with new values.
Main projects: Table. Tokyo, Japan, 2005 T. project. (First prize in residential architecture project sponsored by the Tokyo Electric Power Company). Tokyo, Japan, 2005 Balloon. Tokyo, Japan, 2007 Kanagawa Institute of Technology KAIT kobo. Kanagawa, Japan, 2008 Yohji Yamamoto New York Gansevoort street store, NY, USA, 2008.
Main awards: “low chair and round table” were acquired by the Pompidou Centre. Milan, Italy, 2004, SD Prize for “small garden of row house”. Japan, 2005, Kirin Prize for “Table” . Tokyo , Japan, 2005, First prize in residential architecture project for “t project”. Tokyo, Japan, 2005, “Table” shown at the Basel Art Fair by Gallery Koyanagi in 2006 and acquired by the Israel Museum. Basel , Swiss, 2006.