Green House is a small urban residence located along a lively greenway in Tokyo. The house was conceived as a backdrop to everyday life, engaging both its inhabitants and passersby through its presence along the public path.

Rather than simply facing the greenway, the project creates a terrace and front garden that extend the life of the house outward. Over time, these outdoor spaces are intended to function as an extension of the greenway itself, contributing to the shared landscape of the neighborhood.

The exterior is clad in copper and Japanese cypress, materials that gradually change with weather and age. The façade combines planar and curved surfaces, responding to the verticality and irregular curvature of the surrounding trees. The aim was neither to impose a single dominant expression nor to create a visual collage, but to form an outward-facing appearance that accepts imagination, ambiguity, and change.

Within a limited footprint, the project maximizes the diversity of comfortable places to live. Floors, voids, and niches are composed three-dimensionally, creating a continuous interior in which residents encounter different spatial and environmental qualities throughout the day. A tower-like vertical void on the south side brings light and air to each level through slatted floors, allowing the house to breathe vertically.

Despite its complex form, the house is realized by developing Japan’s traditional post-and-beam timber construction system. By extending this craft-based structure into a contemporary three-dimensional framework, Green House proposes a prototype for urban housing that combines sustainability, traditional building knowledge, and contemporary living.