The concepts Pet Architecture and Micro Public Space come up consistently in your activities. With them, how do you feel smallness is linked to promoting good spatial practice? I am interested in the concept of smallness as it relates to body consciousness – a relationship between space and the body. Since most of our basic understanding of urban space for everyday living is very segregated, life becomes quite mechanical somehow. All the pieces are articulated as a kind of packaged service within the city, and if you have enough money, you can enjoy this itinerary, visiting these packages, one by one. The body, though, is something which tries to go beyond this controlled experience, through inventive spatial practice. In certain places, right when the body goes beyond this package, you can feel like you have discovered the earth – a kind of wild aspect of the living condition of human beings. I like very much the feeling of de-packaging these services. So if you buy a house produced by Sekisui [ an industrialised housing company ] in a new suburban development ninety minutes from Tokyo Station by train, your whole life could be packaged. But on the other hand, in Pet Architecture buildings, which we found to be very interesting, don’t fit into this framework.
Yes, although they lack size, they retain extremely customised functions, and also personalities. Their time and space are not served by anyone or anything, they’re really there, and this condition is irreplaceable. And the participation of the real body really supports the existence of that combination of time and space. This is quite strong for me; it stimulates my sensibility of urban living conditions today. Our intention was to show Pet Architecture as the foreground—I think it is often just pushed to the background. Do you think they play the role of urban monuments? Yes, I think it’s a kind of micro-monument, a witness to the transformation of the city. I found that Pet Architecture emerges out of specific contexts, where new or enlarged streets cut through old urban fabric, or, in spaces where the geometry of curving rivers or railways encounter orthogonal street patterns. They always appear at very unique points where these interventions occur. In that sense, they definitely have a monumental aspect. And people are really fond of these buildings, they become imprinted onto individuals’ memories. If you ask someone to talk about Pet Architecture in their neighbourhood, they can usually mention at least two or three really tiny buildings . . . Compared to an individual’s daily routine, which you frame as a series of complete packages, Pet Architecture becomes a kind of jarring interruption. This tells of an insufficiency or incompleteness in these buildings. But this also allows them to open to the environment – that’s an important quality. They can’t be closed-off systems; they must be helped by other buildings . . . I really like the generosity of Tokyo, which allows these kinds of structures. The city doesn’t want to clean them up, or force every building to be formal. Of course new construction must fit to regulations, but still, they can keep a feeling of informality . . . v
atelier bow-wow
things you might like to know but never have the chance to ask: Atelier Bow-Wow is a translation from the Japanese Atelier Wan, which is, naturally enough, the sound a dog makes in Japanese. Doubling the wordplay, Wan written in phonetic Japanese, is homonymous with One.
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On Site review 23
Small Things
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