Frances Holliss – Learning from Japan
Thursday 14 May 2009, 6:30pm
Having spent a number of years researching dual-use buildings that combine dwelling and workplace [‘workhomes’] in England, Frances Holliss was funded by the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation to make a two-week trip to investigate the architecture of home-based work in Japan.
In this lecture she will present her findings, largely gleaned from a series of conversations with some of Japan’s top architects, including Atelier Bow-Wow and Koh Kitayama, and community activists busy finding empty ‘machiyas’ [traditional Japanese merchant’s houses] for young creative people to inhabit.
The Japanese workhome emerges as building type with a highly developed architecture. And while home-based work remains a marginalised working practice in the UK, in Japan a goal has been set to double the number of home-based workers [from 20%-40% of the overall Japanese workforce] in just three years.
What can we learn from all this?
