NOVELA
year: 2006-2008
use: house
location: yokosuka-city, Kanagawa
floor: 3floor
structure: Steel
site area: 99.24m2
building area: 62.62m2
total floor area: 167.53m2
building coverage ratio: 80%
floor area ratio: 300%
structural design: Kenji Nawa
construction: Daido Kensetsu, Kouki Hirai
photo: Hiroyuki Hirai
staff in charge: Haruka Kodama
October Ueda and Nakagawa Architects

To arrange requested space by the client required three stories. The volume of the house became a cube in the almost same sizes, in width, depth and height. This means to us additional characterless-ness, Palladio and/or Le Corbusier may be happy, though. Therefore, we tried to create "length" for the depth of space and dynamics inside the cube in both horizontal and vertical.

This is personal; desire of an architect and a client, to create interesting space, instinct of space maniac. It is OK because this is a house, personal effects, immovable though. As the space was designed, we realized a cube remains as a cube viewing from the street. We wondered whether our personal and introversive efforts should be expressed to the external or not. To say ethically, internal truth must be expressed externally. It is natural, people say.

We do not know they are modernists or savages; we decided to follow their words. This is because we could not find other choices. It is to express our inner reflections to the outside - with small lies (sometimes needs small lies to be a good man). We did not want to surprise good neighbors. Maybe a mask is needed for architecture sometimes to be a good neighbor to hide chimeric desires of architects. The word "NOVELA" means a new story came to the town.