Directing the
efficacies of regular geometric principles to housing helped initiate a class
of technical architecture formed by modular building blocks, volumes and prefabricated
containers amassed to breed homes and even cities. Illustrated in a diversity
of patterns throughout the 20th century but most notably by Japanese metabolists,
Kisho Kurokawa posited and tested a simple equation, unit+unit+unit…=city, exploring
multiple tessellations for an architecture based on unitary coherence.
Japan’s massive
post war reconstruction efforts paralleled by government support for industrial
development certainly played an important role in establishing these patterns
for building adaptable and reconfigurable architectures based on a simple mass
produced capsules. Described most characteristically for the Nagakin Capsule Tower (1970) but also
explored for the Capsule Village (1972)
and for the Concrete Capsule House
(1975), the capsules were designed as complete technological liveable containers
to be plugged into a shared infrastructure or megastructure. Each megastructure
was designed as a base and conduit for implanting or detaching prefabricated
boxes as the city grew or needs evolved.
The Capsule Village designed to receive
leisure dwellings in a plug and play pod format was perhaps the purest
expression of the metabolist vision. A large-scale three-dimensional truss spanned
intermediately placed concrete supports charting a steep topography outlining a
field of potential dwelling outlets. The dancing megastructure touching the
landscape sporadically presented the idea of minimal site disturbance further
informing its potential to be constructed or deconstructed as needed. The «homo
movens» (the mobile man) zeitgeist was central to the development of this type
of evolving structure.
The tubular space
frame was the chassis for attaching circulation elements, ductwork for piping
and power lines distributing services to containers affixed to the space frame
by mechanical and reversible joints. Each capsule of monocoque construction
measured 3 meters by 6 meters was organized according to three dwelling
functions: hygiene, eating and sleeping. The mechanical box like aesthetic
exemplifies the designer's fascination with space age imagery. Present in both
the capsule tower and the Capsule Village the simple rectangular geometry
associated with dwelling reduced the home to a no frills functional unit, a
type of micro architecture that integrated home and furniture into an ergonomic
whole.
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| Capsule Tower (left) Capsule Village (right) |
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