Designer Domicile

[2triky]

[Coligny]

Another one of those things that looks good on the catalog but make you want to kill youself when you have to live in...

The exterior is covered in the same metal siding as the roof giving a more toned down, uniform look.

I'd say more cheap industrial shed... Wont survive long with the local weather anyway.

I don't see a single aircooling unit nor facilities to put the condenser outside, big windows, apparently single pane, no curtains...

Yea just about right... between living there and a jail sentence, i'd take the jail... at least they usually have woodworking workshops....

[Russell]

Another one of those things that looks good on the catalog but make you want to kill youself when you have to live in...

LOL.

Yes, completely agree with this. Surface area is also quite large, which means

• more maintenance of outside walls, which may not be a problem for such a disposable house, since it will be trashed within 20 years anyway,
• more walls to isolate, or in absence of proper isolation, more walls having substantial thermal flow with the outside.

I'd say more cheap industrial shed... Wont survive long with the local weather anyway.

I don't see a single aircooling unit nor facilities to put the condenser outside, big windows, apparently single pane, no curtains...

Yea just about right... between living there and a jail sentence, i'd take the jail... at least they usually have woodworking workshops....

But your cell may be next to Jack's...

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

I loved it, but agree the exterior makes it look like a backyard shed.

[2triky]

I loved it, but agree the exterior makes it look like a backyard shed.

Yeah, I think a different choice of materials for the exterior might have been a bit more aesthetically pleasing.

[yanpa]

We turned down (or more precisely declined to pursue further) a "designer" house which was in almost the right location at almost the right price, which had a very nice interior and some fancy eco heating system which looked like it might be a cut above the norm, partly because the exterior appeared to have been inspired by an IKEA warehouse (blue corrugated sheeting which will probably look crap in 10 year's time and would probably be hard/expensive to repair).

[BigInJapan]

I don't see a single aircooling unit nor facilities to put the condenser outside, big windows, apparently single pane, no curtains...

I'm a fan of architecture that looks great, and is highly functional.
This house does have that "designer look", but as others have indicated, the drab exterior, and large apparently curtain-less windows etc. detract from it's functionality.
It has another main design flaw that I see often in Japan - no overhang on the roof, and it doesn't look like it even has gutters.
Those huge windows combined with no overhang means brutal heat in summer, and potential moisture damage (the walls will look weathered pretty fast).

[Cyka UchuuJin]

Satoshi Kurosaki's Le49 house is in my current architectural spank bank. he's a goddamn genius.

http://www.kurosakisatoshi.com/architecture/2011/le49/index.html

[Russell]

Satoshi Kurosaki's Le49 house is in my current architectural spank bank. he's a goddamn genius.

http://www.kurosakisatoshi.com/architecture/2011/le49/index.html

I always wonder how these "genius architecturial creations" will look like once people start living in it...

[Cyka UchuuJin]

I always wonder how these "genius architecturial creations" will look like once people start living in it...

i've seen the interior layout of this one. it's got some of our furniture in it, so naturally it looks amazing.

seriously though, when a family commissions a house like this, in typical japanese fashion, everything has a preplanned cabinet, cupboard, shelf that everything will go on/into. these houses generally never look/feel 'lived in'.

[Coligny]

Satoshi Kurosaki's Le49 house is in my current architectural spank bank. he's a goddamn genius.

http://www.kurosakisatoshi.com/architecture/2011/le49/index.html

I bet you'ze not a big fan of victorian era designs...

Git outt'a mah lawn kidz...

[Cyka UchuuJin]

I bet you'ze not a big fan of victorian era designs...

Git outt'a mah lawn kidz...

sometimes i am.

[Coligny]

sometimes i am.

I bet you do...

(no offense intended and shit... wanted to post that pict around 6 month ago to answer to some post, but could not find it, took me the last 6 month of dumpster diving my HD to finally recover it... so now must use it before losing it again...)

[Russell]

I bet you'ze not a big fan of victorian era designs...

sometimes i am.

I bet you do...

(no offense intended and shit... wanted to post that pict around 6 month ago to answer to some post, but could not find it, took me the last 6 month of dumpster diving my HD to finally recover it... so now must use it before losing it again...)

Cyka, looks he set a trap for you.

[Sa_Race]

We are in 2012, may be it's time to introduce urban control, building codes, and environmental law to Japan.

[Samurai_Jerk]

[2triky]

Oh how sickeningly Japanese. They love to make a space feel as small and cramped as possible.

Well, it ain't fuggin' Beverly Hills.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Well, it ain't fuggin' Beverly Hills.

That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the way they like to partition everything necessarily into multiple tiny rooms. They're starting to get over that though. You actually see homes with a nice open plan these days.

[Coligny]

That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the way they like to partition everything necessarily into multiple tiny rooms. They're starting to get over that though. You actually see homes with a nice open plan these days.

There might be a link with the criminal heating system they use... a small room is hard enough to warm... And the snow in Nagoya is much much worse than the 1-day-every-2-years we got. More like few weeks of snowfall every winter and in these cases... th3 harbles... they freeze.

[Coligny]

Meanwhile in a dystopian island known as gr8t Br1t4in:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2127039/Green-tax-conservatories-Home-improvements-trigger-10-levy.html

While laws for rehabilitation project or new buildings feels like common sense (mainly for rental property where the tenant is fucked if nothing is done by the owner) Being obliged to do some totally unrelated isolation work when you need to replace your boiler sounds like a parrallel universe level of madness...

England... what has youz becomed...

[Coligny]

We are in 2012, may be it's time to introduce urban control, building codes, and environmental law to Japan.

Bu... bu... butttt they have 4 seasons and shit' you racist nazi antisemite scum... (for those not aware, that's the standard greeting you get in France when criticising anybody who might not be from your neighbourghood... islamofacist are still fire at will target though... Still feel warm and fuzzy when at the start on the internet in France the leagues of French jewish student -licra- simply wanted it shutdown because you could download picture of swastikas... good times good times...)

[Dreamy_Peach]

I was reading Brutus Casa the other day in a cafe. Quite enjoyable and informative, with many innovative and interesting designs. The Japanese can get away with being adventuresome as they wish due to the overall messiness of their cities. It's quite nice, though I agree that these houses are probably not practical to live in.

This was one such example. As you can see, a house designed totally of glass.

http://magazineworld.jp/casabrutus/143/read/

Must be a nightmare to heat, and would probably be pretty dangerous in an earthquake, not forgetting the privacy aspects either.

In just one of the other overly designed houses featured in the magazine there was a photo of the daughters huddled round an electric plug in stove: tells you a lot about the degree of innovativeness. They had fancy architects but the house would be substandard to most of us from countries with proper building regulations or customs.

On this point, while I agree for the most part with Coligny that the UK is indeed dystopian - just imagine how much more comfortable living in Japan would be if the Government had the balls to actually require "reforms" to also install proper insulation etc; or houses came with the energy efficiency booklets found across the EU. Might seem like big brother, petty redtape, but that kind of information is pretty useful for informed house buying. Here you'd have to commission your own studies and they probably wouldn't even understand what you were on about. I guess that nothing would happen to old stock, but for new stock.. wow...

One can but dream ... maybe in 25 or 30 years ...