pantograph

This was an interior redesign for the aging facilities of a university institute. To meet all the given conditions with a limited budget, I intentionally made the space into one large room, with a giant piece of movable furniture positioned like an island in the center. With bookshelves contained inside, the gigantic piece of furniture can be stretched and compressed in the manner of a pantograph (a parallelogram-shaped device that expands or contracts vertically or horizontally, used traditionally for duplication; also, a similar apparatus mounted on top of a train) in harmony with the fluid space around it. It forms a sort of diaphragm-like “breathing” partition-wall structure, uniquely suited to the needs of a sports medicine institute where both research and physical training take place. The designs of the wallpaper on both sides of the furniture panels are carefully selected so that the interior shows different aspects on different days as it is reconfigured.

photos by Yoshiro Masuda