Hikone Studio Apartments | Alphaville Architects

We have designed an apartment consisting of 6 units of 1DK on the site like a flagpole surrounded by old townhouses near the Hikone Castle in Japan.

There are existing houses surrounding the three sides of the site, which becomes a space with six meters in length facing the road. According to the local regulation, we have to provide three parking spaces for six households. In the hope of allowing the natural lightening and ventilation go into the building, the windows are orientated to the north-south direction. Besides, we made the shape of the building like cutting two corners from rectangle, following the direction of the sun. As a result, all the flats are double-aspect.

There are six apartments in total. A Japanese typical One-room apartment consists of Dining kitchen, private bathroom with toilet and sink counter. It is about 30m² (fig.1).

We organized the spaces following the three principles below:

1.    Service space to the center.

2.    Semi private (public) space.

3.    Private space enveloped by sliding doors.

Therefore, the different levels of privacy in space allow the residents to choose their relation with the environment by their feelings.

In addition, among the six apartments, we provided four different typologies. On the first and the second floor, the two flats on each floor are mirrored with different layout for the interior. On the top floor, the arrangement varies with the roof. Such variety offers the occupants with more options to choose from.

Combining both traditional and contemporary elements in one, with its prime location around train station, this building can become an attractive and convenient home for the young generation.