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Our Architectural Works #2

Penthouse Japanese Tatami Room in Tokyo

On the top floor of a Tokyo building, a hideaway salon built around an eight-mat tatami room — where a rooftop tea garden, hand-worked timber, and the city skyline meet in quiet.

On the top floor of a building in Tokyo, a busy daily life gives way to a hideaway salon centred on an eight-mat tatami room.

At the entrance, a deity from the owner's collection rests on a shelf cut from a single horse-chestnut plank. In the hall, a natural shibori log serves as the alcove post, and 2,500-year-old cedar forms the side floor;
the structural beams are concealed behind a woven-bamboo and rafter ceiling that carries hidden light.

An open-plan salon, a live-edge counter, a mizuya, and a waiting bench flow into one another, while a rooftop tea garden opens onto the skyline.

Eight-mat tatami room with a natural shibori log post, a tokonoma scroll and a woven-bamboo ceiling, a traditional Japanese interior in a Tokyo penthouse.

The eight-mat tatami room

A natural shibori log stands as the alcove post, with 2,500-year-old cedar at the side floor. A woven-bamboo and rafter ceiling conceals the beams, and hidden light settles softly into the timber.

Tatami room opening onto a rooftop tea garden with a maple, stepping stones and a bamboo fence above the Tokyo skyline, contemporary Japanese architecture.

The rooftop tea garden opens

With the screens slid open, the tatami room continues straight onto a rooftop tea garden. Maple, stepping stones, and a stone water basin bring a small turning of the seasons to the top of the city.

Openwork transom carved with a circle, triangle and square in cedar grain, a fine detail of Japanese architecture.

Circle, triangle and square

A transom is carved through with a circle, a triangle, and a square — the forms with which Zen once expressed the universe — worked by hand into the grain of cedar, their outlines surfacing quietly with the light.

Openwork transom carved with a circle, triangle and square in cedar grain, a fine detail of Japanese architecture.

The live-edge counter at dusk

Cut-glass cups rest on a single live-edge counter. Beyond the kumiko lattice, the owner's deity glows in the light, while glass pendants warm the hands below — a seat in a hideaway to settle into at the end of the day.

  • Rooftop Japanese garden with a maple, mondo grass, stepping stones and a bamboo fence, set against the city skyline under a blue sky.
  • Tatami room opening onto a rooftop tea garden with a maple, stepping stones and a bamboo fence above the Tokyo skyline, contemporary Japanese architecture.
  • Long kitchen counter with glass pendant lights at dusk, a tatami room with shoji screens visible to one side.
  • Stone tsukubai water basin with a bamboo ladle among ferns, mondo grass and stepping stones in a rooftop tea garden.
  • A low hearth island with an iron kettle before wide windows opening to a rooftop garden of maple and stepping stones.
  • Tokonoma alcove with a rope-netted gold vessel, a hanging calligraphy scroll and a single flower beside a natural log post.
  • Eight-mat tatami hall with a tokonoma and a descending woven-bamboo and rafter ceiling, seen from the salon by day.
  • Waiting area with a cedar bench, a natural-edge post and an andon wall light beside an arched threshold to the tatami room.
  • Open-plan top-floor salon at dusk with a timber counter, a low hearth cabinet and an illuminated entrance alcove, a modern Japanese interior in Tokyo.
  • Daytime salon counter looking onto a rooftop garden, with a black-topped hearth and an iron kettle beside floor-to-ceiling windows.
  • Entrance hall with a hand-carved deity on a single horse-chestnut plank shelf, cedar sliding doors and a tiled floor.
  • View from the waiting bench through timber posts toward the salon counter and the tatami hall beyond.
  • Raised tatami room glowing at dusk beyond an open-plan salon, showing the layered spaces of contemporary Japanese architecture.
  • Mizuya preparation room with cedar shelving and a bamboo-slat base, opening toward the tatami hall.
  • Close view of cut-glass ware on a lacquer tray atop a live-edge counter, beside a kumiko asanoha lattice panel.

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