Saito House

Sharpening

Saito House

Completion : 07.2015
Location : Tokyo Japan
Use : House
Client : Eisei Saito
Photo : Tomoki Hirokawa
Collaborator : Seitaro Aso

This is a project to renovate a duplex house located in a quiet residential area in Setagaya-ku, Tokyo. Once it was handed over to its new owner, we were employed to renovate the two-story house with two-by-four construction. To be specific, we renovated the living, dining and kitchen areas, as well as added a new workspace.

CONCEPT

CONCEPT

In this project, we avoided removing the existing finish where possible in order to reduce dismantling costs and applied the new finishing material directly onto the original finish. To be specific, herringbone flooring and large tiles were directly applied onto the existing floor material, and the original cloth-finished wall and ceiling surfaces were directly covered by plasterboard and finished with paint.

On the other hand, removal work was minimized; the main things removed were the partition wall between the dining-kitchen and the living room, which became functionally unnecessary and the cases of the sashes. The two-by-four members revealed due to the removal of the original finish have been kept exposed.

The reason why we intentionally have kept these members exposed, which demonstrate how old this house is and the manner of its construction, is because we thought that we would like to keep the previously hidden history of the house visible in the interior space.

HIDE

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