Shopping Street Apartment

In the context of shifting business conditions in the Bakurocho wholesale garment district, this project aims to enhance the unique identity of the neighborhood. By providing housing, studios, and retail spaces for start-ups, it brings life back to one of the area’s key shopping streets. Inspired by the layering of elements in traditional Japanese shopfronts, the hybrid timber and steel structure provides infrastructure for the insertion of both permanent and temporary partitions. Different programs are separated by different enclosures, allowing for physical accessibility for retail spaces, visual accessibility for studio spaces, and privacy for the apartments. Open studio spaces along the stairs reveal behind-the-scenes processes of design and production. This continuation of street life into the private realm creates a strong tie between designers and the existing shopping district and also breaks the barrier between old and new.