Since the House in Chiharada was built very close to an existing residence, the designers chose a pure white cylindrical shape to contrast with the existing building’s traditional rectilinear form. The towers’ doors and windows were also sized at different heights and widths, adding yet another interesting quirk to the architecture.
The circular ground floor is divided into four living quadrants: one master bedroom, two rooms for children, and a washroom. The ground floor was built with low ceilings in order to double the ceiling height of the second floor, which is flooded with natural light from skylights.
Each room on the ground floor also has an enclosed staircase that doubles as a point of access to the upper-level and columns of light that help channel sunlight from the second floor into each of the rooms below. The last of the five staircases wraps around the outside perimeter of the house to create outdoor access to the second floor.
“By intersecting the living space from exterior to interior and from upstairs to downstairs,” architect Miho Iwatsuki told Dezeen, “the hierarchy between the first floor and the second floor disappears and individual functions and sceneries mix together.”
+ Studio Velocity
Via Dezeen
