A Cat Tree House / Tan Yamanouchi & AWGL
Rethinking a home by the eyes of purchasers who don’t communicate human language – The undertaking deliberate as a residence and studio of its architect is in Kamakura, a metropolis full of wealthy historical past and plush greenery and positioned about an hour from central Tokyo. In the home lives a pair of their thirties with two cats. For cats, the home is their complete world. Wishing to learn to design a home from the views of our dearest felines, we determined to treat our two cats as “two clients.” Having lived with the 2 for ten years, we took our design cues from “listening” to them, though they don’t communicate human phrases.
The requests from the cats may roughly be divided into three classes. The first was to have the ability to select their “preferred tier of temperature” at any day and time. As they will sense the tiers of temperature by minute variations in top that we people can’t understand, they like to maneuver round, selecting their place of choice. The second was to have the ability to be in the identical room as their relations, however not too shut. They are keen on spending time near their cohabiters whereas hiding a bit or protecting a distance. The third request was to have a number of selections of locations the place they might really feel protected. The two choose to maneuver from one snug area to a different (which every cat has their very own) impulsively because the seasons come and go.
Thus, we determined to design the housing as one massive cat tree – Conceiving the entire home as a big staircase; we positioned an atrium with a prime mild within the middle to encompass it with spiral steps. The pure mild shining by the skylight window illuminates every step of the caracole one after the other all through the day. The rises are designed based mostly on the physique measurements of our cats, which led to having 23 completely different flooring ranges. The total home is thus divided into positive stripes of temperature layers, between which our feline purchasers spend all day touring. The spiral staircase, wrapped across the atrium with a skylight, was designed to permit the inhabitants to go searching the entire home from anyplace with out obstructing the road of imaginative and prescient. The normal dimension of the run of every step is generously set to 900 millimeters in order that the cats can disguise from folks downstairs, maintain a sure sense of distance from others, and even sleep peacefully.
The staircase is a cantilever impressed by tamasudare, a display screen fabricated from loosely woven bamboo sticks for a standard Japanese avenue efficiency, the place performers twist, fold, and lengthen it to type varied shapes. The construction is uncovered to provide an accent to the open ceiling area. To reply to the extremely humid atmosphere of Kamakura, the starkly designed split-level was an inexpensive answer. The normal flooring stage is ready one meter above the bottom stage, making a buffer area between the raft basis and the ground, the place outdoors air is launched, and sizzling water pipes for flooring heating are laid. We designed the buffer for temperature and humidity management.
On every nook of the caracole, a bed room, visitor room, studio, kitchen, eating room, and loo are positioned for our purchasers to search out snug spots impulsively. As that is an architect’s studio as a lot as a home, it inevitably has fixed friends. When we now have sudden guests, every room additionally capabilities as a hiding place for the cats. The mountain views of Kamakura impressed the design of the handrails carried out within the atrium for fall prevention. Skilled ironworkers crafted the fragile stainless-steel fixture. We designed a bookshelf in a cantilever construction on the wall constructed alongside the spiral steps, reworking the staircase from a mere passage to a split-level library. For the cats, the steps perform as cozy bedding, whereas for us people, they turn out to be a e-book vault with appropriate top variations to take a seat anyplace. Part of the round steps bisects backward, which reaches on the finish a window carried out on the eye stage of cats, and the ultimate rise of the steps is as excessive as a human chair to offer a porch-like area for them. The undertaking is designed to convey a bodily narrative in all plans and sections.
Furthermore, we responded to the picturesque view of Kamakura by panorama design and the outside type of structure. The backyard design is split roughly into two zones. One is the Approach Zone, which results in the doorway and the backyard going through the entrance highway. Another is the Terrace Zone, which incorporates the wood deck steps and a kitchen backyard, surrounded by a 1.8-meter-high wall on the again of the building.
There are roughly 80 species of vegetation planted within the Approach Zone. We mixed and adjusted many alternative colours to completely design the colour palette. Considering the wealthy website, we intentionally reduce the variety of species from the unique flora and as a substitute aimed so as to add an accent to the panorama by our alternative of vegetation. There have been guests from the neighborhood every single day because the completion, and we consider we now have succeeded in designing a pleasing planting scheme. In the Terrace Zone, there are roughly 20 species of edible herbs. The versatile out of doors area coated with aromatic wooden chips additionally offers a spot to take a seat on the steps and revel in a meal.
The type of this home consists of two L-shaped volumes, every with a shed roof of various angles. By interlocking the 2 volumes, we designed a basic form that simplifies building and blends in with the mountains of Kamakura but avoids being a home we now have all seen earlier than. We additionally consider that cats searching the window is a sight that improves the neighborhood panorama. We meticulously designed the position and the peak of the home windows in order that passersby and guests can admire the adorableness of the cats as part of the architectural exterior and the surroundings.
In Japan, there are ten instances extra pet cats than new child infants. The variety of pets in complete exceeds the variety of youngsters as properly. In addition, Japan is among the fastest-aging international locations, with growing curiosity in animal remedy. Therefore, we aimed to contemplate life with cats critically from an architect’s perspective. For cats, the home is their complete world. We wished to learn to design a home from a feline perspective. We took our design cues from what we gleaned from the ten years of dwelling with them. By taking in not solely the cats’ phrases nor the human’s, we strived to suggest an architectural method that embraces and mixes the phrases of each cats and people.
