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This amazing wooden modern mansion is located in Chiba, Japan, surrounded by high, green peaks on one side and the infinite ocean on the other. This dream houses’s shape was derived from these two imposing natural elements.

“The client requested a comfortable, generously proportioned living, dining and kitchen area, a bathroom overlooking the ocean, a guest room, and a spare room that could be used to display his beloved car.”

Takeshi Hirobe Architects

The japanese architects chose to integrate their project into the encircling environment by using timber panel walls and timber space trusses, a more modern way of building with wood. This technique stands at the base of the design beacuse it dictates and limitates how this wooden modern mansion looks. There are certain restraints that appear when using wood, especially because of its fizical atributes like elasticity, rezistance to stress and behaviour in time. However, it is a proper way of building when you want to achieve a modern-rustic structure that integrates in a certain place, offers a traditional look whilst providing every bit of a contemporary home’s feeling and appeal.

Probably the most important feature of this swooden modern mansion is the fact that the sides that face the ocean and the mountains are made completely of glass and provide it’s inhabbitants with surreal images of the landscape and light. This gesture also helps create a relationship between the two formidable natural elements, a connection, much desired by any of us. What can be more beautiful than the sea and the mountains at the same time? The atributes of the interior are greatly increased and a lot of value is added to the house.

Another aspect of the structural system is its ability to influence the interior feeling of the modern mansion. There are almost no upright walls; the fact that every element is inclined creates a very vibrant and dynamic appearance, in terms of both interior and exterior. The gesture certainly contributes to the uniqueness and one of a kind presence of this project. The wood through its feel and color balance the lively shape of the modern mansion and generate a more calm and serene luxurious interior environment proper for a home.

architect: takeshi hirobe
photo courtesy: koichi torimura and takeshi hirobe architects
project name: villa SSK
location: chiba, japan
date of completion: 05/2012
principal use: weekend residence
structure: wooden structure
site area: 854.28m2
total floor area: 105.05 m2
design period: 07/2009 – 12/2010
construction period: 01/2011 – 05/2012
structural engineer: akira ouchi /s form
external wall: galvanized steel sheet
internal wall: exposed beam, japan cedar t=12mm w=200mm lining
ceiling: exposed beam, japan cedar t=12mm w=200mm lining
floor: tile, walnut flooring
furniture: japanese ash fancy plywood wax finish