A true Japanese experience through architecture
By Geoffrey P. Moussas
Design details that surprise and delight
Colorful smokescreen as a design element
The architectural concept of the Genji Kyoto can best be described as one that is striving for a true Japanese experience through materiality and spatial techniques such as thoroughly integrating interior and exterior spaces. These techniques have been expressed in Japanese architecture through the centuries since the Heian period, the era in which the Tale of Genji is set.
Materiality - Wood imprint
Although a wooden structure is not generally recommended for multi-story hotels nowadays due to safety reasons, the essence of wood has been preserved in Genji Kyoto through a technique known in Japan as sugi ita katawaku (杉板型枠). In this very Japanese technique, the imprint of cedar boards is left like a fossil on the concrete throughout the interior and exterior of the building. This not only gives the concrete a natural organic wood pattern, but also a much softer, warmer feel. (see video)
Hotel chief designer and architect Geoff Moussas shows how cedar patterns are imprinted on concrete. Video by Yew Apostole Moussas
Washi play on light
In the lobby of the hotel, the upper windows showcase contemporary architectural applications of handmade washi paper, which vary dramatically with natural lighting conditions.
Washi-laminated windows seen from the front entrance of Genji Kyoto.
The making of washi is a 1,300-year Japanese craft inscribed as an intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO. Throughout that long history, washi has been used for windows, doors, partitions, furniture, art, religious and everyday objects. However, the organic nature of the mulberry fiber paper has made it a challenge to use as a material in modern architecture.
Thanks to washi artist Eriko Horiki, who nurtured a renaissance of this traditional technology through the addition of innovative techniques, washi has found new avenues for its use and appreciation.
Hotel architect Geoff Moussas with washi artist Eriko Horiki.
Preparing for installation of washi panels for Genji Kyoto’s upper lobby windows.
Collaboration with Eriko Horiki
In collaboration with Ms. Horiki, custom-made large-scale washi panels were produced for the hotel's lobby windows and incorporated into the architecture in such a way that results in a stunning effect being achieved for the exterior and the interior. Depending on the hours and lighting conditions, the exterior will change with the magnitude and direction of sunlight, and the interior similarly will experience a dynamic transformation in ambience and character of space.
Washi in contemporary architecture
Story of Washi artist Eriko Horiki
Spatial arrangement - modern tribute to Heian architecture
The very first thought in the hotel's design was to keep the original proportions of the machiya (町家) that previously occupied the site. These typically long and narrow townhouse plans, with a garden at the back, date back to the Heian period over a thousand years ago.
To mirror such a layout, the hotel was conceived as having two “wings”, connected by a bridge through a metaphorical Japanese garden. The proportions of the rooms mimic the machiya layout, and allow for virtually every room to have stunning views of the Kamo River and nearby Higashiyama mountains, or of one’s own tsubo niwa (坪庭).
Characteristic plan of a machiya townhouse with shop facing street, living quarters inside, storehouse at the back and small gardens in between, connecting spaces and increasing ventilation. Image from Japanese Garden Design by Marc Peter Keane.
Tsubo gardens, which are small courtyard oases of calm and harmony, originated in the Heian shinden (寝殿) palaces featured in the Tale of Genji. Through continuous evolution over a millennium, these gardens have survived in today’s Japanese architecture, integrating interior and exterior spaces, and augmenting both connectivity and ventilation. Incorporating these tsubo gardens into guest rooms allows for natural cross ventilation as well as seamless connectivity between the interior and exterior.
Setting of a shinden residence with corridors linking halls and pavilions around gardens and ponds, with emphasis on connectivity between interior and exterior. Image from Japanese Garden Design by Marc Peter Keane.
Ki (気) and vitality from gardens
Hotel's 2 wings connected by a bridge through a Japanese garden. Both bridge and garden inspired by the Tale of Genji.
The naka niwa, a larger courtyard garden with a bridge connecting the building’s east and west wings on the lobby level, not only integrates architecture and nature but helps the hotel acquire its vitality. As our garden designer Marc Peter Keane puts it, it allows the whole space to be imbued with ki, or life-energy. The concept of the garden and bridge initiated on the first floor continues all the way up through the building, culminating in the roof garden and gives the overall project a contemplative unity between architecture and landscape. (See more on Gardens)
Geoffrey P. Moussas of Design 1st is a New York-born, MIT-trained and Kyoto-based architect who has lived in Japan since 1994. Apart from designing Genji Kyoto and private homes, he restored or redesigned some 40 traditional Japanese structures such as machiya townhouses, restaurants, tearooms, kura (storehouses) and temples, including a 400-year Buddhist temple in with the addition of an ossuary. His work has been featured in Financial Times, Casa Brutus, CNN and NHK amongst others, and exhibited in Kiyomizu Temple and Nijo Castle. He lectured in institutes including Kyoto University, Waseda University and Kansai University. He wrote a book titled Engawa no Shisou (Philosophy of the Veranda).