Topknot House is located in Kamakura, Japan. It stands nearby the station, and there are apartment buildings to its west and north sides. The original house had been through reduction and extension in size in the past.The northern half of it was built in 1983 and the southern half was added in 2007. The two parts were connected only through the ground floor. Our mission wasto remove the northern half and add a new one-story part to the remaining part of it.

As there were a three-story building to its southern side,a four-story apartment building to its western side, and two more two-story houses adjacent to it, the condition we were given in terms of the sun light and ventilation was not easy. For that we provided two small gardening spaces and alittle volume, so called a Topknot extension, that vertically protrudesfrom the top of the roofto solve the problems. Through thelouver two gardens and outside are connected providing an extended atmosphere and privacy to the inside. The Topknot part not only let the sunlight but also the wind, just like a chimney does, to the inside.

This house was for a couple in their seventies. Five of their grandchildren now and then visit the couple and they play around under the eaves and the bench next to the entrance door on the north side of the house.