Nikotama Terrace Cooperative Home / Okuno Architectural Planning

Text description provided by the architects. The Nikotama Terrace is a cooperative house located on the hillside of the Kokubunji cliff line that runs from Futakotamagawa to Kinuta. The site faces the slope called “Mamushizawa”, which used to be a valley, and is protected by the cliff line ordinance. It is a green place, like a mountain, surrounded by native species of the Musashino Plateau. There is also a large retaining wall on the site to eliminate the height difference. The main concern was how to confront this retaining wall and the building while making the best use of the height difference in the surrounding area? The design answer came as a row house (10 dwelling units) with a green valley.

The buildings are arranged in a hook shape to take advantage of the green landscape axis of the cliff line that descends from east to west at the top of Seta Tamagawa Shrine, and the north-south landscape axis that descends from the borrowed scenery of the neighboring land on the north side to the Tamagawa River. bottom. 

The space created between the retaining wall and the building created a “terrace-like” (a flat place that opens quickly) space, such as that which you encounter while climbing a mountain. It was planned as a common space for residents that doubles as a row house passage = a green valley. The atmosphere of the mountains is maintained by covering the ground with dirt floor-like ground and wood chips.

The dwelling unit consists of a maisonette on the 1st floor with a basement floor and maisonettes on the 1st and 2nd floor. The basement and the second floor are tunnel-shaped skeletons with a ceiling height of 3.2m to 4.0m. On the second floor, there is a large window that connects the green landscape. 

On the basement floor, the height difference in the site is used to create a space that connects to the garden. Since it is a cooperative house that can be freely customized for each dwelling unit, it is a rich living space that is three-dimensional and varied, such as incorporating a loft and enjoying the ceiling height as it is.

For the green valley and rooftop vegetation, we planted native species that form the green landscape of the Musashino Plateau, in hopes that in the future they will grow like the trees of Seta Tamagawa Shrine creating a residence in the forest that inherits the original scenery of the Kokubunji cliff line.