Cookpad — Ikejiri: a kitchen that runs through three floors

Concept

Three characters

The building has a ground floor open to the street and a basement and second floor that are hard to see into. The design accepts these characters as conditions where behaviour and relationships change.

A place close to the town and quiet inward places exist together, giving the office several kinds of distance.

01 · Kitchen

Not a perk, a meeting place

The kitchen runs across this structure. It is not a welfare facility or a rest area, but a place where people drop in without a reason and end up talking. People gathering and routes crossing matter more than cooking.

02 · Time

Morning, noon and night

Who gathers changes through the day, so people who never met find themselves together. The office was planned to keep room for “something to happen” as it is used, rather than fixing its use on completion.