THREAD. Shin Takamatsu is 1 of Japan’s greatest living architects, with an incredibly unique & beautifully executed body of mysterious & pregnant work that ought 2b far better known, & probably would be if they fit a more stereotypical idea of Japanese design....

This detail & the previous image are of his Kirin Plaza in Osaka from 1987, sadly, like several of his best works, demolished (in 2009)

In an era that fetishised atchitectural representations, his brooding and powerful drawings became well known in the architectural world, leading some to think of him as a paper architect.

However his architecture is so much more intense and exquisitely crafted in the flesh than the drawings hint at. Something revealed in preparatory models, here (and the previous drawing) of his design for the Shiroganedai Minato, Tokyo, from 1987-88

This is his Syntax in Kyoto from 1990, (sadly demolished in 2009), which was an immense presence on its street. See the quote from him on the design that gives you a sense of the crepuscular edginess that infuses his work...

In Kyoto there is a wild little collection of his projects together for a fashion company, Origins 1 (left, with my brother in front of it) from 1981 & Origins 3 from 1986

There is always a sense of encrusted fortification mixed with obsessively articulated pinhole points of observation in his work, a bristling atmosphere of formal agitation. Here is his Pharaoh Dental Clinic in Kyoto from 1984
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Photo by David Ewen

This is Earthtecture Sub-1 in Tokyo from 1991, where the whole office building is submerged underground, the only trace above being this strange garden of steel, glass & gtanite letting light downwards & letting ppl like my friend Alyssa in the second photo take silly-posed pics

Here’s an interior view and another photo of his Pharaoh Dental Clinic from 1984

This is ARK in Kyoto, from 1983

Just look at the articulation in what is for him a “flat” facade, here on Hilios, in Kobe, from 1988-91, it just writhes & squirms

Imanishi Motoakasaka, Tokyo, 1991. This one is an absolute mind bender in real life, and seems to lurk like a huge spider in wait for you, setback from the streetline in an otherwise extremely placid part of the city...

Here are a few more pictures...

You can see from this text describing a visit of his to Italy & Austria, that his way of thinking & writing is as dense and exquisitely tortured as the designs of his buildings...

One of his many unbuilt designs from the 1980s, rendered beautifully in black & white as always

Minatosakai Community Center, Sakaiminato, 1997. One of the last buildings by him which exhibit his intensely evocative compositional ability, before his practice sadly became deeply unfashionable and had to ‘change with the times’

If you’re interested in the context in which his architecture came about, a sadly ignored and special period in Japanese architectural production, please see my wider thread about it here: https://twitter.com/furmadamadam/status/1171760223914266625

This is Takamatsu’s Octagon, in Ebisu, Tokyo, from 1992

One of his smallest, but one of my favourites is Tattoo in Sapporo, 1989

I believe the only building he designed thst utilised colour, though I’m not sure if there is a story as to why... Week Building, Shin Takamatsu, Kyoto, Japan, 1986

Oh and there was that time I bought a second hand book and it turned out it was signed by the master Shin Takamatsu himself

One of his most ‘normal’ buildings, Ining, Kyoto, 1990

Photo by ellen's attic on Flickr

This was his design for the Moon tower, a skyscraper in Osaka, which I was obsessed with as a youngster, and still so badly wish had been built...

This was another skyscraper proposal by Takamatsu that I got very excited about but was sadly never built, Ela Tower, next to the Ayalon in Tel Aviv, Israel, from 1996