Umbrella House – one of the milestones of twentieth-century Japanese architecture, built in 1961 and designed by Kazuo Shinohara – risked demolishing. As soon as she heard the news, however, Kazuyo Sejima, from SANAA, contacted the president of Vitra, Rolf Fehlbaum, who made possible the dismantling of the small single-family house and its reconstruction within the Vitra Campus.
Kazuo Shinhoara’s Umbrella House relocated into the Vitra Campus
Saved from demolition at the initiative of Sanaa's Kazuyo Sejima, the original building was dismantled and transported from Tokyo to Germany.
Image courtesy of Vitra. Photography by Dejan Jovanovic.
Image courtesy of Vitra. Photography by Dejan Jovanovic.
Photography by Akio Kawasumi.
Photography by Akio Kawasumi.
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- Lucia Brandoli
- 16 June 2022
Initially built in Tokyo, in the Nerima district, the tiny house – only 592 square feet – is the last existing project among the works belonging to Shinohara’s “First style”. While returning to some characteristics of the Japanese tradition – as in the case of the roof, which mentions those of Buddhist temples; or the wooden structure, with traditional sliding walls – Shinohara declared that he wanted to give life to an architecture able to adapt to contemporary living conditions, without falling into useless nostalgia.
Image courtesy of Vitra. Photography by Dejan Jovanovic.
Image courtesy of Vitra. Photography by Dejan Jovanovic.
Photography by Akio Kawasumi.
Photography by Akio Kawasumi.