(“Text as submitted by architect”)
Practice Ideology
The aim of Ryohei Tanaka / G Architects Studio in design is to create a new harmony between the past and the present. It is not just nostalgia.
Japan is their home country, and one with a long history. Like some other Asian countries, some parts of the city center are lined with modern, characterless buildings, and the deterioration of the cityscape is a problem.
As one proposal, the Studio designed a very small building. The building is located in Kyoto, an old city in Japan. They used the properties of copper and applied it to modern architectural design. Copper changes color depending on the degree of oxidation, but they used soy sauce and chemicals to chemically change the degree of oxidation. It was a design that seemed to control time, and they were able to balance a modern design with respect for history in a mediocre cityscape.
