It’s becoming more difficult to tell what is right and what the best design is in a new residential area when houses are built in a range of different forms and using a variety of different materials. How can a house be designed without being caught in such an idea? What we imagined for this question was trying to identify a house from a bird’s-eye view. Imagine a bird trying to find somewhere to land while flying in the sky…

The first thing to find in a crowded residential area in the city, featuring houses in different shapes, would be a tree standing in the middle of a square, almost large enough to cover the house and much higher than its surroundings.

The house in Uneda-higashi was designed for a tree that would grow greatly from its current size. The tree planted in the courtyard on the second floor will develop its root to the first floor and grow with the power from the earth. The tree attracts birds, insects, the changes of the four seasons, sunlight coming through the trees, the sound of the wind, the overlapping months and days, a breath of air, hydrated skin, tree climbing, picking of the fallen leaves…

Different things, from natural scenery, to people’s lives, reside in the tree that connects people with the sky and the land. It is an oasis like a dot in an urban landscape seen as an ocean of buildings.

In modern times, as buildings become ever taller, people are starting to gain a bird’s-eye view. However, many people since the olden days have already had this naturally through their imaginations. A place where you can gain comfort can be a home which becomes rooted between the sky and the land, both together with time and over time.