East Meets West in 3 Modern Japanese Homes

With fewer Japanese preferring to live entirely in traditional style — sitting, dining and sleeping exclusively in tatami rooms furnished with low tables and cushions — newer homes in Japan are often hybrids. Most have Western-style rooms for dining and sitting, as well as Japanese elements such as sliding doors, tatami areas and traditional baths. This successful blending of native and foreign styles is a typically Japanese approach that ensures both comfort and cultural continuity. Here’s a look at three examples.

1. A View to the Outdoors

This house south of Kyoto appears traditionally Japanese from the outside, but inside it has a mix of Western and Japanese elements. The paper-covered interior doors (fusuma) and exterior hallway (engawa) are traditional, while the wood-floored living room and sofa are Western-style.


The engawa is broader than that of a traditional Japanese house, and it features glass — rather than wood — sliding outer doors (amado). The openness of the house and glass door at the far end of the hallway are more Californian in spirit than Japanese.


The house’s open kitchen, pendant lights, furniture, wood floors and second-floor balcony are also Western features that blend well with the house’s traditional elements.

See more of this house


2. Wood and Light in a Blended Townhouse

The exterior of this downtown Kyoto house is reminiscent of a machiya, the traditional Kyoto merchant’s home, with its louvered windows, direct access from the street and lack of setback.


Inside, the home’s traditional tatami room contains an in-floor heating element for a kotatsu (a quilt-covered table used in winter) and faces a typical Japanese enclosed garden. But the wood plank ceiling and dining-area floor are decidedly Western in style.


A small divider separates the Western-style dining area from a modern galley kitchen with streamlined cabinetry. Another non-Japanese element is the skylight, which floods the downstairs with natural light.


In the same house, shoji (wood and paper dividers) let in light between rooms while providing privacy. The office has Western-style furniture and lots of built-in storage.

See more of this home


3. Japanese Elements Woven In

Although mostly Western in style, the living area in this home on Kyushu, Japan’s southernmost main island, contains a raised platform covered by tatami, left, for traditional dining and seating. Glass amado slide open for easy access to the garden.


Another view of the living room reveals a hybrid garden that contains both a Western-style lawn and large, decorative stones. The stones, an important element of traditional Japanese garden design, are chosen for their aesthetic qualities and are often very expensive.


From the garden, the house appears Western in style because of its brick exterior, flat overhang and concrete terrace. But the elevation of the terrace mimics the engawa of traditional Japanese houses. The border of river rocks also is traditional. Both decorative and functional, it delineates the garden and provides drainage.

See more of this residence

More: 12 Elements of the Traditional Japanese Home

URL: East Meets West in 3 Modern Japanese Homes http://www.decor-ideas.org/cases-view-id-26736.html