Nakagin Capsule Tower © Noritaka Minami
Completed in 1972, the Nakagin Capsule Tower is located in central Tokyo and designed by Japanese architect Kurokawa Kisho. It also has both residential and office functions, and is a rare sample in metabolic architecture. The metabolic movement is a movement that marked Japan's post-war cultural renaissance.
Nakagin Capsule Tower © Tom Blachford
The BOC Capsule Tower is the world's first permanent tower-like building with a function of use, which still exists today, but has fallen into disrepair and is seriously dilapidated, after 15 years of reconstruction and dismantling of the public opinion tug-of-war, as the originator of the construction industry, the BOC Capsule Tower, announced that it will be demolished in September, and the demolition of the BOC must be with regret.
© Humberto Vidal | Shutterstock
"Architecture is like a theater, the lead actor is the user, and the design technique is the director who guides the user to dialogue with the space."
- Noriaki Kurokawa
© Manuel Ascanio | Shutterstock
The building consists of two eleven- and thirteen-storey interconnected concrete towers, precast concrete capsules containing 140 separate facilities, arranged around vertical reinforced concrete cores.
Each capsule is the same, with precast concrete walls crammed into bathroom units, air conditioning systems, color televisions. After the components are made in Osaka, they are transported by truck to Tokyo. The assembly time for each concrete chamber is about 3 hours. Within a month, all the capsule silo units were sold.
© In 1970, the capsule tower was built during the construction process by Baicheng Advertising Co., Ltd
Each capsule apartment is 2.5 meters wide and 4 meters deep, and has a window with a side length of 1.3 meters on the façade. Each unit can be used as a small living room or as an office, and the units can also be combined with each other to form a larger space.
The connection between the units is secured by four high-pressure bolts to one of the two core barrels, a form of fixation that makes both units interchangeable. Although the unit structure was originally conceivable as replaceable, none of the units have been replaced since the completion of the building.
Nakagin Capsule Tower © Silver Capsule Tower preservation and resurgence painting
Before being transported to the construction site, the capsule units have been pre-configured with living facilities and then assembled on site. The fixed structure of each capsule is self-contained and suspended in the shaft, so that the replacement of the unit has no effect on the other units at all. The unit is a fully welded galvanized lightweight stainless steel truss box, reinforced ribbed steel pipe coated with anti-rust paint, and finally sprayed with Takeda brand exterior wall varnish.
The core is made of reinforced concrete, the basement to the second floor is made of ordinary concrete, and the top of the second floor is lightweight concrete. The template consists of a huge sheet of panels, the height of which is the height of a one-story tower. This form of construction takes two days to build the steel structure, followed by two days of precast concrete work. The order of operation of the stairs follows the framing project. The time to build the elevator on site was shortened by using a 3D coordinate system, slide rails, and anchor point indicator boxes in precast concrete elements.
© Nakagin Tower
In 2006, the demolition of the tower was taken into account, and it was assessed that the demolition of each capsule would cost about 620,000 yen.
80% of capsule owners agreed to the demolition of the building, and the first demolition began on April 15, 2007. Most owners, struggling with the dirty and crowded environment and fearing the hidden dangers of flammable asbestos fibers, voted in favor of demolishing the building and building a larger and more modern tower on the original site.
In order to preserve his design work, Kurokawa proposed to make full use of the flexibility of the design, "unpluging" the existing old box and replacing it with an upgraded unit. This project is supported by major architectural associations such as the Japan Architectural Association.
Even so, tower residents still have to face inadequate seismic standards. In addition, although it is close to a land area like Ginza in Tokyo, the use of the building is inefficient. Noriaki Kurokawa died in 2007, and was affected by the economic downturn of the late 20th century, and the building was replaced by no one.
© Arcspace
The building's hot water supply was shut down in 2010.
In 2014, Mr. Maeda, one of the capsule apartment occupants, launched the "BOC Capsule Rescue and Regeneration Project" to launch a crowdfunding campaign to buy all the capsule protection building buildings around the world.
The Nakagin Capsule Tower is a strange building in the eyes of many people, but many people also find a world of creativity here. The most impressive thing is the "Monthly Capsule" campaign launched in 2018 in collaboration with MUJI. Over a period of about two and a half years, it attracted more than 200 applications and successfully drew the attention of many to the building. With the different users, it also presents a rich and diverse appearance, some people use it to stay, and some creative people rent it as a studio, or they can be hidden in the city.
Silver Capsule Preservation and Regeneration Program Official Website: https://www.nakagincapsuletower.com/
"BOC Capsule Tower Preservation and Resurgence Painting" not only promotes various activities, but also actively seeks funds and negotiates with developers to preserve the building. However, due to the impact of the epidemic that began to spread in 2020, all discussions were terminated. After the building had been untouched for about 35 years, the concrete had corroded and fallen into disrepair, and the land on which the building was located had to be agreed to be sold, in the absence of safety concerns. But it is also undeniable that it was the construction of the China Silver Capsule Building that inspired many great architectural ideas later.
Nakagin Capsule Tower © Arcspace
Axonometric and elevation drawings © agontarz
Capsules assembled © agontarz
© William Harbison.
© William Harbison
Metabolic Steps © 2021 by Baicheng Advertising Ltd
Nakagin Capsule Tower © Kurokawa Noriaki
Floor plan and capsule floor plan © agontarz
About Kisho Kurokawa
Noriaki Kurokawa (1934-2007) was Japan's first post-war architect, a leader in Japanese architecture, and one of the founders of the Metabolist Movement. He was a creative and revolutionary thinker whose major works include the National Gallery of Art in Tokyo, the New Wing of the Van Gogh Museum of Art in Amsterdam, the New International Airport in Kuala Lumpur, the Hiroshima Museum of Contemporary Art in Japan, the Roppongi National Art Museum in Tokyo, and the Nakagin Capsule Building in Ginza, Tokyo.
Noriaki Kurokawa's "metabolism", the "mushroom-shaped house" in agricultural cities
Toshiba IHI Pavilion © Flickr user m-louis
The metabolists believe that design is an extension of human activity and advocate more flexible, renewable architectural concepts. Kurokawa died of a myocardial infarction in 2007, and looking back at his work can be divided into the era of "metabolism" before the 1970s and the era of "symbiotic thought" after the mid-1970s.
National Art Center via gltjp
Kuala Lumpur New International Airport via beetify
References：
1.https://archeyes.com/nakagin-capsule-tower-kisho-kurokawa/
2.https://www.shoppingdesign.com.tw/post/view/6807
3.http://www.ideaxia.com/talent_info.php?id=93
4.https://www.archdaily.cn/cn/892177/adjing-dian-zhong-yin-xiao-nang-ta-hei-chuan-ji-zhang
5.https://www.archdaily.cn/cn/961390/hei-chuan-ji-zhang-ming-zuo-zhong-yin-xiao-nang-ta-huo-mian-lin-chai-chu-wei-ji
6.http://agontarz.com/portfolio/case-study-nakagin-capsule-tower/
7.https://bauldearquitectura.wordpress.com/2014/12/30/regresando-al-futuro-la-nakagin-capsule-tower-y-las-teorias-metabolistas/
8.https://www.shoppingdesign.com.tw/post/view/6807
9.https://www.nakagincapsuletower.com/
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