In 1951, Edward Hopper painted what was to become the hallmark of his personal foray into Surrealism. Though it could arguably be described as a painting of a white wall, Rooms by the Sea takes the viewer inside a typical mid-century American home, where an open door to the right of the composition suggests the house is perched directly over a waterfront with no visible means of egress. The initial sense of familiarity suddenly slips through the cracks, and the viewer is taken somewhere else entirely.
Japanese firm Yasutaka Yoshimura Architects must have sought an experience to the same effect when designing a time-share vacation residence an hour from Tokyo. Though located significantly closer to the city than most vacation homes, ‘Nowhere But Sajima’ uses an arrangement of angled, tubular spaces facing the ocean to sweep its sojourners to another world. More after the jump.
Built on a plot of reclaimed land, ‘Nowhere But Sajima’ occupies a triangular block, one corner of which is taken up by a spiral staircase that traverses all three floors. The rest of the building is broken up into parallel strips of rooms with varying widths, many of which can be combined at will to accommodate different extended-stay functions.
Each of the rooms possesses its own aesthetic, relying on unique features like ocular skylights, arched windows, angled ceilings, and painted walls to construct a distinctive spatial experience. With just a few strides, occupants can move from a secluded study nook to an expansive living area, pass through a sliding door that doubles as a bookshelf, and walk over wood, tile and rusticated stone floors. But the most striking feature of the building is its fantastic relationship with the exterior; the triangular floor plan crosscuts all of the rooms on a diagonal, providing each space with an isolated floor-to-ceiling view of the ocean, much like in Hopper’s canvas. ‘Nowhere But Sajima’ removes its inhabitants from the urban milieu and moves them to escape into their minds.
[All images courtesy the architects, via Designboom]
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