A Japanese apartment at the crossroads of domestic and industrial

Roovice’s design for an apartment in Kamakura, Japan, is part of Kariage, an interesting initiative carried out by the Japanese firm, which involves renovating empty and abandoned dwellings, increasing their value without costs to the owners, and guaranteeing their management through leasing contracts for the next 6-8 years. The project itself is distinguished by a few, but decisive, elements. The new plan reports minimal changes, designed to expand the space. From the entrance, the perspective runs almost immediately into the kitchen area, an open space separated from the large living room by a partition interrupted by two passages, deliberately left open, as backstages framing moments of everyday life.
Beyond the bedroom and bathroom, Roovice carves out a third room furnished with multifunctional shelving able to meet diversified needs, to walk-in closets, as well as home office.

The most significant thing, however, probably lies in the decision to leave the raw structure of the apartment left by the removal of the previous finishes: thus, the raw concrete walls and mortar floor contrast with the new lauan wood furniture and the teal tones of the kitchen and the wall behind. Lighting rails alternate with lamps of recognizable design. In this atmosphere at the limits of domesticity, the true essence of the house resides in an extraordinarily dense apparatus of objects: paintings, mirrors, rugs, pot plants, hanging plants in ceilings and walls, books, LPs, handcrafted objects and iconic items from the 1980s, containers and organizers of all kinds, a fridge covered with stickers, a skateboard that became a coffee table.