From Imperial Power to Consumer Power : Imperial Palace, Kyoto to Naka Incineration Plant, Hiroshima
The Naka Incineration Plant Hiroshima illustrates Japan's movement from a pre-modern, feudal, society to a post-modern, consumer society.
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John Barr
Feb 26, 201920 min read
Tokyo Story : Looking Without Trying to Prove Anything
Between 1932 and 1962 Yasujiro Ozu made a series of films that provide a slice of Tokyo life during the arrival of Modernism in Japan.
John Barr
Dec 12, 20189 min read
Do|Co|Mo|Mo|Japan|05 : Kagawa Prefectural Government Offices : Takamatsu : Kenzo Tange
The Kagawa Prefectural Government Offices (1958) offered a radical new vision of what Japanese public buildings might be.
John Barr
Nov 21, 20186 min read
Do|Co|Mo|Mo|Japan|04 : The Hiroshima Peace Centre : Kenzo Tange
The background to the Hiroshima Peace Centre hardly needs to be explained: the first use of the Atomic Bomb and the deaths of over 200,000.
John Barr
Nov 3, 20183 min read
Do|Co|Mo|Mo|Japan|03 : International House of Japan : Kunio Maekawa, Junzo Sakakura, Junzo Yoshimura
The International House of Japan reflects the changed realities for Japan after WWII.
John Barr
Jun 29, 201813 min read
Kiyonori Kikutake (The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde)
The widow of Japanese Architect Kiyonori Kikutake has described different facets of her husband's personality, one gentle and reflective.
John Barr
May 21, 20187 min read
Sabi (A Matter of Life and Death)
Sabi is an important concept in Japanese aesthetics that can be difficult to grasp because there is no directly equivalent word in English.
John Barr
Apr 25, 201816 min read
Katsura Imperial Villa (All Things to All Men)
In the 20th century Katsura Imperial Villa became a kind of touchstone for the essence of Japanese architecture.
John Barr
Dec 10, 20178 min read
The Golden Temple (Zen and the Theory of Everything)
The Golden Temple in Kyoto is viewed through the eyes of the psychopathic arsonist of Yushio Mishima's novel.
John Barr
Oct 1, 201711 min read
In Search of Japan-ness : Part 2 (We're All Japanese Now)
An examination of Jun'Ichiro Tanizaki's essay In'ei Raisan (In Praise of Shadows).
John Barr
Sep 3, 201713 min read
In Search of Japan-ness : Part 1 (Putting Lipstick on the Gorilla)
For Japanese architects, 1933 was a pivotal year in their search for a Japanese modernism.
John Barr
Aug 1, 20179 min read
Two Houses: Bonus Track (Sticking it to The Man)
The Akatsuka House is perhaps the only example of architecture making a political statement in Japan.
John Barr
Apr 30, 20174 min read
Bullshit from the Barbican
Are we still indulging in 19th century Exoticism and Orientalism in our view of Japan and Japanese architecture?
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