See Sea Park is a place where people gather, spend time, and do business. The initial idea was to recreate Chinju-no-Mori (forest surrounding shrines) in modern times. Instead of a closed space, the architects designed a space that unfolds on the ground horizontally The aim is to create a kind of place where rural private houses accumulate in a village to create an attractive spatial density with the topography that is an impressive, yet timeless place familiar to the people.
Buildings absorb and store solar energy and occasionally release heat. In sync with the thermal condition of the earth, there is a unit that holds the air in the upper layer. This is inspired and lightly reproduced from traditional Japanese homes.
As a metaphor for a tiled or thatched roof, which holds heat and air, the architects created “units” composed of air masses covered with transparent ETFE (fluoropolymer film). The units exchange energy with the exterior and stabilize the internal environment. In all, the building comprises 72 cube-shaped units, along with 15 tree pillars that support them.
Each unit is 4.8m²x2.4m high, with a ring-shaped core in the center and diagonal members that radiate. The units are combined and gathered together to create an arch-like truss structure, freeing up space below, from the layered mountainous area to the coastal side. People can easily access the area below the lightly floating units. Sunlight shines through a structural prism composed of cedar louvers, filling the interior environment with warm, light.
Rather than using conventional energy-saving ideas, which secure energy in an isolated space with highly insulated and airtight walls, the architecture adopts an open, gentle environment. The “unit” is a basic structure wherein a flexible truss supports a large space and expands endlessly.
Photographer: Tomoki Hahakura
Source: V2com
