“70sqm in Tokyo” is the interior renovation project of a room of 40 years old apartment in central Tokyo.

This house is for a couple and two little children. The original plan is a very typical 70sqm Japanese so-called “family type” apartment room plan. Once open the entrance door, you can see a straight corridor with a basin area and private rooms at both sides. The space on the left side is usually to be designed as living space. These rules are now still be used by housing maker in Japan again and again. 

N min. from X station, N sqm N years old building

These few elements nearly decide Japanese real estate value, but for this project, our goal is to fulfill unique and site-specific residence for them within this so-called “family type, quite average” 70sqm area housing.

“We four family members would like to live close together!” The client’s motivation becomes our primary goal to renovate the house.

First of all, we preserve about 30sqm, almost half of the total area, as the living room from 70sqm. After that, we designed 2.5m width X 1.6m depth large dining table and the minimum area bedroom because they are used to huddle together sleeping using Japanese Futon.  The wet area is also minimized as much as possible.

Besides that, we divided storage unit into each room instead of building fixed walls. The toilet, the refrigerator has also become a subject for storing in this project, because all these items are contained as furniture in our design.

And predicting the children need private rooms in the future, we designed composition smartly to keep two child rooms only by adjusting the positions of bedroom doors.

Removing dead ends and creating ease of getting around emphasizes the extent of psychological space and preserving wind passage. Once open the windows, one can feel the comfortable, natural breeze.