The Japanese architects EASTERN Design Office created Japanese house. It had a studio supported above the residence on two mounds of crushed marble. Mountains and Opening House was a home and studio for a footwear designer. The house design was a design room for a Japanese sneaker brand as well as a residential house. The site is in Takarazuka-city of Hyogo Prefecture. It was located in an exclusive residential district that commanded an entire view of the Osaka Plain. The mountain house was built on the slope of a hill with an elevation of 330 meters. The level difference of the site was 8 meters.
A mound by piling up soil excavated from the slope formed the outside (exterior) mountain. A type of raw material made from crushed marble called “Kansui” was the surface of the mound. Glittering fragments of crushed marble on a white surface shine brilliantly. There were two White Mountains. The inside of White Mountain was the living quarters while a top the white mountainous wave was a deck.
The function of one of the two White Mountains was as a structural support for this building, while the other mountain enveloped the bathroom. The living spaces of the residential quarters were set these two mountains.
The framework of the upper floor made of steel and the lower floor made of concrete. The upper floor created a sense of being on the deck of a boat. To achieve this feeling, architectural columns and walls were designed as to make one unaware of their existence.
Entering the house from the northern road, a 14meter wide opening and the 16.5 meter x3 meter terrace outside create the feeling that your own body is floating in the scenery. This is a deck. To achieve this, we used two different methods.
The upper floor were different as way as the lower floor. A design room was the upper floor. The lower floor was residential quarters. In the residential quarters, there were public spaces. The color of this house was white that mixed the blue sky. It reflected the light of fragments of marble scattered in the raw material which covers on the surface of two newly built mountains.
