Archinect - News

Kengo Kuma to design new mixed-use shopping center for Miami's Design District

2024-04-24T17:36:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma Associates has shared the announcement of a new mixed-use project in the Miami Design District.

The MIRAI Design District is a $1 billion development to be realized at 65,000 square feet with 16,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and another 40,000 square feet of high-end offices located above.

Image courtesy Kengo Kuma and Associates

The development's marketing arm describes the spaces as "each in meticulously curated, modular bays for luxury brands and trophy offices," designed to "allow each brand its own identity."

From there, a "series of micro-experiences" will define the concept, which is located at the intersection of Northeast 42nd Street and 2nd Avenue. The building's two main transparent mesh facades are angled to create a mix of shadows and greet users from different angles, while the shops underneath are serviced by a wooden soffit pedestrian walkway.

Image courtesy Kengo Kuma and Associates

The design district was also recently announced as the location...

Kim Kardashian and Tadao Ando meet on Palm Springs dream home design

2023-04-07T16:38:00-04:00

Apparent Japanese architecture aficionado Kim Kardashian recently traveled to the country to meet with Pritzker winner Tadao Ando, according to an Instagram post made by the celebrity mogul Thursday.

Ando is designing a private residence for Kardashian in the Palm Springs area, the details of which were first uncovered by Vogue magazine last year. In her post, Kardashian implied its construction was set to break ground soon, though she was sparse on other design details aside from sharing what appears to be a rendering of a grey cast concrete structure that more closely resembles a contemporary art museum than a home.

Ando has designed several celebrity residences over the years, including a $75 million compound for fashion designer Tom Ford and the Malibu home currently owned by Kardashian’s troubled ex-husband following a $57.3 million post-divorce splurge. Kardashian is also reportedly in talks with Kengo Kuma for another vacation residence at an undisclosed American lakeside loc...

Kengo Kuma completes Japanese farmhouse resort surrounding rice terraces

2022-09-20T11:10:00-04:00

Work has been completed on the Kengo Kuma and Associates-designed KAI Yufuin, a hot spring hotel on the Japanese island of Kyushu. The resort sees a landscape of rice terraces enclosed by several buildings containing public functions, a bathhouse, guest rooms, and villa suites.

Exterior. Photo credit: Hoshino Resorts

The scheme’s three anchor buildings, namely the public building, bathhouse building, and guest room building, are defined by long gabled roofs with low eaves heights. The buildings’ exteriors are clad in charcoal grey to blend with the deep green hue of the surrounding forest, while the entrance is distinguished by a series of bamboo exterior walls.

Entrance. Photo credit: Hoshino Resorts

Rice Terrace. Photo credit: Hoshino Resorts

The interior architecture surrounding the rice terraces is based on the concept of a “fine farmhouse” presenting a bespoke interior that nonetheless follows the spatial structure of vernacular Japanese farm...

Kengo Kuma hopes to 'blur the line' between outdoor activity and office work in San Jose

2022-05-12T13:45:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma and Associates has unveiled plans for a new biophilia-laden office complex in downtown San Jose, California.

Under the monicker “Park Habitat,” the massive new 1.3-million-square-foot development offers 20 stories of office and retail spaces which are beset by a network of internal and external parks and gardens.

In a new manifesto published by the group Westbank Campus, the international development group’s founder Ian Gillespie outlined his reasoning for choosing the influential Japanese architect for a design whose scope purportedly entails a focus on user wellness and local environment.

Previously on Archinect: BIG, Kengo Kuma, and Studio Gang tapped for Westbank's San Jose masterplan

“I chose Kengo for a very deliberate reason: Kuma-San has risen to the pinnacle of his profession by blurring the lines between nature and the built environment. His practice is dedicated to making buildings less definitive or solid and more ephemeral. In essence, creating a particular co...

Take a look inside Kengo Kuma's newly-opened Hans Christian Andersen Museum

2022-04-14T15:34:00-04:00

One of Denmark’s most highly publicized cultural projects has now officially begun its public operation after being previously inaugurated in a soft opening last June.

Set amongst a massive new public park that opened earlier in the fall, Kengo Kuma and Associates’ design for the new H.C.Andersen Hus museum in Odense is a “fantasy world” of interconnected circular forms which give shape to the museum’s more than 60,000 square feet of education centers and subterranean exhibition space.

Photo: Rasmus Hjortshøj - COAST

Visitors can experience the physical dualities endemic in the architecture and inspired by classic Andersen tales like The Tinderbox and The Little Mermaid. After entering through an extension of the writer’s adjacent birth home, they begin their journey on the timber-clad upper level and descend into an unraveling underground labyrinth containing a “unique artistic experience” designed by Event Communications dotted with evocative commissi...

Kim Kardashian taps Tadao Ando and Kengo Kuma for post-divorce vacation homes

2022-02-11T12:30:00-05:00

At present, Pritzker Prize–winning architect Tadao Ando is building Kim’s Palm Springs home, which she describes as “concrete, gray-toned, and really zen,” while Kengo Kuma, who designed the National Stadium for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as well as LVMH’s Japan headquarters, is creating a glass-and-wood lake house for her in an undisclosed location, where Kim travels every Fourth of July.

The Palm Springs home and new Kuma design will offer some competition to the pricey portfolio her ex-husband has been building with his recent $57.3 million acquisition of an Ando-designed Malibu home that was custom-built for investment manager Richard Sachs in 2013.

Tadao Ando Interview with Archinect: 20 Minutes with a Master

Kardashian, who visited Ando's Chichu Art Museum in her past life with the Donda rapper, recently acquired ownership of the couple’s minimalist Hidden Hills home in the fall as part of the stipulation for their now-finalized divorce The Vogue cover girl credited the design process and collaboration with Axel Vervoodt with instigating a “love affair with architecture, specifically Japanese” as she spoke with the magazine’s Jen Wang about her SKIMS side hustle and new redefining role as the face of Balenciaga.

The Proust Questionnaire: Kengo Kuma

Kengo Kuma sets in stone an impressive stereotomic-inspired cathedral intervention in Western France

2021-10-28T19:17:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma and Associates (KKAA) has begun construction on a much-needed cathedral addition that will add a contemporary feel in "harmonious dialogue" with a 12th-century structure set on the edge of the historic Loire Valley in France.

The cathedral is host to several important polychromatic sculptures from the Middle Ages which will be protected by the new intervention.

With preservation in mind, KKAA’s design will transform the western portal of the Cathédrale Saint-Maurice in Angers into an improved entrance that presents the stone relics in an open gallery with sculptural archways and improved wayfinding from the outside into the bifurcated portal.

Viewed from the western entrance, the addition presents an astounding visual symmetry with the 900-year-old rebuilt Gothic cathedral. The grooved rectangular intervention is a few meters removed from the original structure, cast using stonework processes that...

Kengo Kuma has been named one of TIME Magazine's 100 Most Influential People

2021-09-16T18:38:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma champions an ideal of “losing architecture”—intricate buildings that disappear into their environs—although it’s hard to miss the new National Stadium … His stylistic fingerprints can be seen throughout the elaborate project … Greenery dots the facade of the oval-shaped structure, the centerpiece of this year’s Games, allowing a series of wooden eaves—a favored material for Kuma, procured from prefectures across Japan—to better blend in with the surrounding garden.

Kengo Kuma’s design for the Japan National Stadium served as the centerpiece for this year’s Tokyo Olympic Games. Kuma also recently announced museum projects with literary tie-ins in Denmark and Norway and has been able to add sneaker collaborations and homeware to his portfolio successfully.

The 67-year-old Yokohama native joins Jeanne Gang, David Adjaye, and Bjarke Ingels as architects to be named to the prestigious list in the past five years.

A look back at when architects competed for Olympic glory

2021-07-26T16:21:00-04:00

Friday's Opening Ceremony in Tokyo inaugurated the XXXII Olympiad in a dazzling spectacle that drew praise from audiences worldwide even as a growing protest against the games echoed in streets around the city. Kengo Kuma’s National Stadium provided an ample backdrop for this year’s version of a tradition begun in Ancient Greece and revived again by the progressive Olympic movement that fostered an elementary version of the modern-day games at the end of the 19th century.

Pierre de Coubertin’s intents for a combined international athletic and artistic competition traced its philosophy to the Hellenic notions of mind and body harmony and was formally observed until being dissipated by an indifferent OC as the games became more and more commercialized following World War II.

What has since become an annual exhibition saw its fulfillment in the electric arts program that preceded the ceremonial torch lighting that kicks off the Olympics following the Parade of Nations. Featuring an a...

L.A.'s 1111 Sunset Boulevard development shows signs of life again

2021-03-15T18:46:00-04:00

After three years of quiet, a proposal to redevelop the former headquarters of the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) with a trio of high-rise buildings has taken a key step forward: the release of the project's draft environmental impact report.

The project previously on Archinect: Kengo Kuma to design boutique hotel for downtown L.A.'s 1111 Sunset Boulevard development. Rendering: Kilograph, courtesy of SOM/Palisades.

Kengo Kuma turns literary fantasy into an exciting spatial experience with the new Hans Christian Andersen Museum

2021-03-12T15:08:00-05:00

Kengo Kuma & Associates' new design for the Hans Christian Andersen Museum is underway. Pulling reference from Andersen's tales Kuma and his team bring the famed author and his writings to life in an exciting spatial experience. "The museum will provide a unique artistic experience, which combines landscape, architecture, and modern exhibition design, and it will offer new perspectives on one of the most beloved and creative thinkers in world history," shares the museum team.

The firm was selected for the museum project after winning first prize for the international design competition in 2016. Slated to open Summer 2021, visualizations of the project's dreamy outdoor landscapes complement Andersen's fantastical tales. The 60,277 square foot (5,600 square meters) museum site contains a children's house and an underground museum that intertwines with the garden.

Kuma was inspired by the author's fairytale "The Tinderbox" which tells the story of a soldier who learns of a magical un...

Kengo Kuma unveils design for Ibsen Library in Skien, Norway

2020-10-28T19:09:00-04:00

The Ibsen Library, designed by Kengo Kuma & Associates in collaboration with Mad Arkitekter and BuroHappold, was commissioned in celebration of the renowned playwright Henrik Ibsen, who was born in Skien, Norway, the location of the new library.

Selected as the winning entry of a design competition, the Ibsen Library introduces a new cultural hub to the city of Skien that houses a robust program to engage the surrounding community.

The footprint of the library covers the entire site boundary, giving it a generous floor area at the ground and underground levels. Both levels have open plans with no fixes walls and low bookshelves that act as soft dividers. The ground floor is seamlessly connected to the park on the outside, encouraging a connectedness between the indoor and outdoor environments.

The underground level offers adult and children-focused program with an outdoor amphitheater the raises up toward the exter...

'Architecture for Dogs' on display at Japan House London

2020-09-21T17:35:00-04:00

Architecture for Dogs, a playful collection of, well, architecture for dogs, is currently on display for an exhibition at Japan House London. The initiative was "invented by architects" and features designs by architects including MVRDV, Kengo Kuma, Toyo Ito, Ma Yansong, Sou Fujimoto, and many more. Check out some of the structures below:

The Tokyo Toilet Project: Pritzker Prize winners Shigeru Ban, Tadao Ando, Toyo Ito, and Fumihiko Maki among designers of new public restrooms

2020-08-17T14:36:00-04:00

Noteworthy Japanese architects, and even some Pritzker Prize laureates, are among the creators of 17 innovative public restroom designs throughout the bustling Shibuya area of Tokyo. Launched by the non-profit The Nippon Foundation, THE TOKYO TOILET project hopes to create save, clean, and appealing facilities "to make them accessible for everyone regardless of gender, age, or disability, to demonstrate the possibilities of an inclusive society."

Five of the 17 planned facilities, envisioned by Shigeru Ban, Fumihiko Maki, Masamichi Katayama/Wonderwall, and Nao Tamura, have recently opened to the public while more are expected to launch later this year and in 2021.

The Tadao Ando-designed restroom is scheduled to open on September 7th. Toilets created by Toyo Ito, Kengo Kuma, and Sou Fujimoto will be available next year.

Take a look at the initiative's first five releases below.

Designer: Shigeru Ban

Project description: "There are two things we worry about when entering a public r...

All construction of permanent Olympic venues in Tokyo is now complete

2020-03-10T12:53:00-04:00

Construction of all new permanent venues for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics is now complete, organizers said Friday, as preparations continue despite worries over the new coronavirus outbreak. The announcement comes as the International Olympic Committee insisted this week that a potential cancellation or postponement of the Games due to the virus was "not mentioned" at a meeting of their Executive Board.

According to Japan Today, the last venue to be completed was the Tokyo Aquatics Center for swimming, diving, and artistic swimming. It will seat 15,000 fans for the Olympic and Paralympic games. "The main pool features a movable wall allowing the 50-meter facility to be converted into two 25-meter pools," reports Japan Today.

Concerning the coronavirus, Japan Today reports that "organizers have been battling to reassure athletes and would-be spectators that the Games remain on track despite the spread of COVID-19."

Kengo Kuma-designed Ace Hotel Kyoto will open this spring

2020-01-28T14:14:00-05:00

Ace Hotel Kyoto is getting ready to welcome its first guests, and just in time for the high-travel season for the Tokyo Olympic Games this summer. The boutique hotel chain collaborated with Kengo Kuma and Commune Design for the 213-room hotel, which is part new-build and part historic structure that formerly housed the Kyoto Central Telephone Company, which was originally designed by iconic modern architect Tetsuro Yoshida in the 1920s. First announced in 2018, Ace Hotel Kyoto marks the company's first location in Asia.

Guest room seating area. Photo: Stephen Kent Johnson.

Photo: Stephen Kent Johnson.

Inspired by the ancient capital's abundance of nature, art, attention to craft, and profound history, the hotel will feature a lobby, multiple garden courtyards, a gallery, event spaces, collaborations with local artists, a cafe, and three standalone restaurants. Kengo Kuma updated the historic building with a wooden grid system and louvers and meshes that gently filter in natural light ...

Kengo Kuma steps into shoe design with ASICS

2019-12-02T16:01:00-05:00

Architects dabbling in fashion design is nothing new. From Zaha Hadid to Santiago Calatrava and Virgil Abloh, shoe brands often turn to architects for inspiration. In the latest example, Japanese footwear brand ASICS has teamed with Kengo Kuma to design a new running shoe that's said to marry "ASICS’ most cutting edge technology with ancient techniques and Kengo’s beautifully engineered aesthetic to create what he calls his 'smallest building yet,'" according to Isabelle Hore-Thorburn of HIGHESTNOBIETY.

METARIDE AMU running shoe. Image © ASICS

METARIDE™ AMU by KENGO KUMA. Video © ASICS Japan

Kuma's spin on the shoe showcases the "yatara ami" (bamboo knitting) technique that creates two interlocking layers that aid in the foot's natural movement. The design keeps up with the sleek, slip-on attributes shoe brands such as Nike and Adidas have incorporated into their recent lineups while offering a subtle and clean profile in contrast to some of t...

Kengo Kuma-designed Odunpazarı Modern Museum opens in Turkey

2019-09-09T19:59:00-04:00

The Odunpazarı Modern Museum, designed with a synthesis of traditional Ottoman and Japanese architecture, opened on Sept. 7. [...] The museum, founded by construction firm Polimeks chairman and collector Erol Tabanca, was designed by the famous Japanese architectural firm Kengo Kuma and Associates.

First mentioned on Archinect in March, the new private art museum by Turkish construction magnate and collector Erol Tabanca has now officially opened inside a delicate stacked-timber ensemble designed by Kengo Kuma & Associates.

Photo: NAARO

"The architectural design of the building also draws attention as it consists of a group of square-shaped blocks that are surrounded by laminated-timber beams stacked on top of each other," reports Hürriyet Daily News. "The Japanese designer took the historical characteristics of the UNESCO-listed Odunpazarı."

Photo: NAARO

In an interview with the project architects Kengo Kuma and Yuki Ikeguchi which the museum published on its website, Kuma said: "For the OMM building, I wanted to create a sense of intimacy by using small-scale units—to achieve a sense of warmth. Throughout the building, the geometry is not perpendicular. I think the fact that such a geometrical building can also be as organic will surprise people."

Kengo Kuma's Seattle tower dabbles in façadism

2019-07-24T15:11:00-04:00

A quasi-Gothic, Kengo Kuma and Associates-designed 40-story mixed-use skyscraper could be headed to downtown Seattle's Belltown neighborhood.

The project, developed in collaboration with architects Ankrom Moisan, landscape architects Berger Partnership, and developer Pacific Virginia, will not only preserve the facade of the historic Bebb & Gould's Terminal Sales Annex building from 1915, but will also work to use the tower's massing, exterior treatments, and vertically-oriented "regulating lines" to "reinforce the strong Gothic and art deco heritage of Seattle’s downtown."

Massing diagram showing how the new building's geometries relate to the historic building. Images courtesy of City of Seattle, Kengo Kuma & Associates/Ankrom Moisan

A design review submittal to the City of Seattle runs through a variety of options for how the tower's massing might shift to highlight and relate to the Annex. The proposals all share a common trait: The five-story Gothic Revival commercial structure...

Kengo Kuma: 'My dream is to start my own school'

2019-06-19T18:52:00-04:00

INT: Do you think sustainability in architecture is less of an issue in Japan? KK: Historically, traditional Japanese architecture uses very sustainable designs that incorporate features such as natural ventilation instead of air conditioning, and things like that. But in the 20th century, as Western culture came to Japan, we forgot these kinds of designs. That’s what I’m trying to go back to.

"My dream is to start my own school and pass my lessons on to younger generations in the same way that Frank Lloyd Wright did with his School of Architecture at Taliesin [in Wisconsin]," Kengo Kuma told It's Nice That when asked about his future aspirations. "He has inspired me in many ways, but I think this has been his biggest influence on me. It will be an international school in Tokyo, where students will be taught the art of building in harmony with nature."

The Kengo Kuma-designed V&A Dundee in Scotland opened in 2018. Photo: Beth/Flickr

Kengo Kuma-designed art museum to open in Turkey this year

2019-03-15T14:11:00-04:00

The Odunpazari Modern Museum (OMM), a major new institution designed by Kengo Kuma and Associates, will open in the vibrant but ancient university city of Eskişehir in Turkey in June, The Art Newspaper has learned. With stylistic echoes of Kuma’s V&A Dundee, the museum’s stacked timber design reflects surrounding wooden houses from the Ottoman era, and is named after its historic “wood market” district—Odunpazari.

Image courtesy of Odunpazarı Modern Museum (OMM).

"The museum will house and show Turkish and international Modern and contemporary works from the 1,000 piece collection of Erol Tabanca, the architect and partner in Polimeks Holding, a leading Turkish construction firm," writes The Art Newspaper.

First photos of Kengo Kuma-designed Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Tokyo

2019-02-28T14:36:00-05:00

After announcing the launch of its Reserve Roastery in Tokyo back in 2016, Starbucks has now given a look inside the Kengo Kuma-designed space. The store is Starbucks’ fifth Reserve Roastery, and the second time that the concept has opened outside of North America, following the Milan location launched last year.

The four-story coffee temple in Tokyo's Nakameguro neighborhood opened to the caffeine-deprived morning crowds at 7 a.m. today.

"The Tokyo Roastery is the only Starbucks Roastery location designed in collaboration with a local architect from the ground up," explains the project description.

Image: Starbucks

"The exterior was brought to life in collaboration with renowned Japanese architect Kengo Kuma. Envisioned by Liz Muller, Starbucks chief design officer and lead designer for all five Roasteries globally, the Roastery highlights the work of local craftsmen and women to create an enchanting destination for coffee exploration and discovery."

Image: Starbucks

"Upon entering the Roastery, customers are greeted by the world’s largest Starbucks Roastery coffee cask, four stories and more than 55 feet of blush-tinted copper adorned with hand-crafted copper cherry blossoms, which changes hues throughout the day in different lights. The expansive cask was built using the technique of tsuchi...

Kengo Kuma recycles 29 shipping containers for this new Starbucks store

2018-10-04T15:59:00-04:00

The Hualien Bay Mall Starbucks consists of 29 shipping containers and has a total floorspace of 320 sq m (3,444 sq ft), spread over two floors. The containers have been reinforced, modified for glazing, and are painted white. The building's interior, which wasn't designed by Kuma, includes a brightly-colored wall mural representing Taiwan's aboriginal Amis people and offers views of a nearby mountain range.

Kuma has worked with the global coffee giant before, having designed the, now iconic, store in Fukuoka, Japan, and will also be the exterior architect of the upcoming Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Tokyo.

Photo: Starbucks

Just last month, Starbucks announced its plans to design, build, and operate thousands of eco-friendly stores globally by 2025, and the company sees recycled-shipping-container stores as part of this strategy (there are already several other Starbucks stores built from containers, 45 of them in the U.S.).

Here some photos of the interior design, which Kuma however was not in charge of.

Photo: Starbucks

Kengo Kuma's V&A Dundee Museum opens; interiors revealed!

2018-09-13T14:04:00-04:00

The V&A Dundee Museum opens its doors tomorrow with the 3D Festival, a free two-day event on September 14 and 15. The grand opening will include performances, dance, design, and lighting collaborations.

The museum was designed by Kengo Kuma and is his first building in the UK. Along with the forthcoming opening, the museum has unveiled the interior architecture revealing a light filled wooden design.

As Scotland's first design museum, the space features 300 exhibits drawn from the V&A’s collections of Scottish design, as well as from museums and private collections across Scotland and the world.

Free tickets to the 3D Festival on ...

Tokyo Olympic Stadium: construction progress 'as planned'

2018-09-10T14:01:00-04:00

But so far, things have remained “on schedule,” and the Olympic stadium is on pace to be completed by the end of next year. [...] Takeo Takahashi, the general manager of the stadium project, told the media that “roughly four-tenths” of the construction has been completed, but the situation is “as planned.”

It's been deliberately quiet around the NEW New National Stadium in Tokyo after the original, winning design by Zaha Hadid Architects was publicly attacked, and eventually officially canceled by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe himself, and a replacement Olympic Stadium scheme was hastily selected from a pool of two established Japanese architects and expedited to break ground in December 2016.

Kengo Kuma's stadium design is currently under construction and scheduled for completion by November 2019.

But things appear to be going well now; the press was even invited by the Japan Sports Council this summer to tour the massive construction site and document the progress.

New drone video shows off Kengo Kuma's soon to open V&A Dundee Museum

2018-08-23T17:03:00-04:00

The V&A Dundee Museum designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma is a massively dramatic stone-and-glass building. Located in the Scottish coastal city of Dundee, it will be the first institution outside of London to associate with the famous "Victoria & Albert" name and is the architect's first foray into the UK.

Drawing inspiration from the country's famously photogenic cliffs, the new museum is a modern design with a jagged exterior that has drawn comparisons to a Star Wars spacecraft. Positioned between the water and the city, the new museum is at the center of an almost $1.3 billion transformation of the city's waterfront intended to give fresh weight to the idea of Dundee as a destination.

Photo by Hufton+Crow.

Set to open next month, the V&A Dundee Museum will focus primarily on fashion, architecture, design and photography. Its inaugural exhibition, Ocean Liners: Speed & Style, will explore the design and cultural impact of ocean liners on an international scale.

The museum...

Ace Hotel will open its first Japanese location with a Kengo Kuma design

2018-04-09T14:13:00-04:00

The boutique hospitality chain, Ace Hotel has announced it will open its first-ever Japanese outpost next year with a Kengo Kuma designed building in Kyoto. According to the company's president, Brad Wilson, "it’s been [a] long-standing dream to put down roots in Japan." "We feel incredibly humbled and grateful to...make our dreams a reality, creating a space that honors the beauty and history of Kyoto while fostering global connection and cultural innovation" he said.

Known for taking over cool spaces, the hipster hotel chain will be moving into Tetsuro Yoshida’s 1920 Kyoto Central Telephone Officebuilding. Kuma, who is also responsible for Tokyo’s impending Olympic Stadium, will give the building a modern update with a wooden grid system and fine louvers and meshes that gently filter light and wind. The scheme will also feature various gardens which have existed since the Heian period.

According to the hotel, the surrounding neighborhood sits on the former grounds of the imperial ...

Kengo Kuma wants to change the definition of architecture

2018-02-15T17:31:00-05:00

Rejecting flashy forms in favor of buildings in harmony with their environment, the architect — poised to become world famous for his stadium for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo — is trying to reinvent his entire trade. [...] Kuma, a constant source of paradoxes and ironies, often makes demagogic statements on behalf of his own brand of architectural modesty. “I want to change the definition of architecture,” he told me; in a way, he already has.

Nikil Saval pens a beautiful profile of Kengo Kuma for T Magazine and investigates the architect's ongoing quest to ground his version of Modernism in authentic Japanese craftsmanship.

Kengo Kuma to design boutique hotel for downtown L.A.'s 1111 Sunset Boulevard development

2018-01-15T14:16:00-05:00

The $600-million project, called 1111 Sunset, would include high-rise condominium and apartment towers, town houses, shops, restaurants and two acres of public open space designed by James Corner Field Operations, the landscape architect behind New York’s High Line elevated park. [...] The 98-room boutique hotel is to be designed by Kengo Kuma. It would be the major Los Angeles project for the high-profile Japanese architect known for melding his structures to their natural surroundings.

Image: SOM/Palisades.

First announced last October, the redevelopment of the William Pereira-designed former Los Angeles Metropolitan Water District HQ, right on the edge of Downtown Los Angeles and Echo Park, is further taking shape.

Besides new renderings of the 1111 Sunset Boulevard scheme, showing two high-rise residential buildings with several low-rise residences grouped around their bases and an integrated mid-rise hotel, the addition of Kengo Kuma and Stanley Saitowitz / Natoma Architects was revealed. Kuma will be in charge of the hotel design.

Leading the overall architectural planning and landscape design are Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and James Corner Field Operations.

Image: SOM/Palisades.

PLANE—SITE visits Kengo Kuma's Tokyo offices in new Time-Space-Existence video

2017-12-12T13:44:00-05:00

Kengo Kuma is one of Japan’s most significant living architects, thanks to his sophisticated integrations of traditional architecture with up-to-the-minute technologies. Unusually sensitive to materiality and technique, Kuma’s designs are irresistibly tactile, often resembling hand-woven fabrics or an ornate beehive. As part of our partnership with PLANE—SITE (a Berlin-based creative agency working at the interface of urban form, cultural space and social life), we are sharing another video from their Time-Space-Existence series featuring the prominent Japanese architect discussing his work.

In this new short video, PLANE—SITE travels to the Tokyo offices of Kengo Kuma & Associates to discuss the topics of time, space, and existence as they relate to his work. Widely regarded as one of Japan’s most eminent architects, Kuma's most significant buildings include Stone Museum in Nasu, which repurposed stone from old rice stores, the Nagasaki Prefectural Museum and...