This is a house in the northern part of Hyogo Prefecture for a couple and their two children. The construction site is a part of a place surrounded by mountains and the sky is overcast most of the days. I wanted to create light, stable indoor climate and came up with a plan of three sheds of house type arranged on a 1.8 m high, grey foundation platform.

The level of the first floor was lowered by 760 mm below the ground to get firm basement, as the site was slant before the development, and to get more stable performance of the floor heating system of foundation heat condensing type utilizing the terrestrial heat. It was also expected that the whole site could be used like a garden as the rooftop neared the ground thereby. The site is at the corner entering the residential area and I thought that lowering the rooftop would leave wide visibility to the surroundings of the mountains and the sky, and that it would be beneficial to the whole residential area.

On the foundation platform I arranged three-for a bathroom, for a sunroom and for a guestroom. The bathroom shed and the sunroom shed provide lighting and ventilation for the lower floor. They form a overhead courtyard in a sense. Especially the sunroom collects heat in winter, and exhausts heat in summer by the breeze through the five motor-operated windows.

The three shed s do not actually provide spaces for usual staying but cover the living floor on the foundation platform. This resulted in keeping away from neighboring eyes and keeping in touch with eyes of children playing in the garden or nearby. Accordingly, I think, both delicate closeness and distance to the surroundings have been realized.

The residential area including the site was developed in recent years and is the front for the fields to change further to building lots. It was anticipated that brand-new commercialization houses would be built one after another. By constructing a house looking as small as a peasant's work shed of such material as vernacular as corrugated panels in an agricultural area I expected for this house to be a tie for the prospective rows of such new houses and the rural landscape still existing.