Café Kureon

Description

- The café is located in Toyama, Japan encompassing a meadow and the 197 square-meter restaurant that appeared to be floating and minimally touching the ground.
  
  The restaurant design is absolutely stunning with its internal dining area placed within a glass enclosed box on the overview. The exterior of which is wrapped with interlocking lengths of timber making the concept appeared organic and earthy. ‘It’s building with wood as though it’s masonry,’ says architect Kengo Kuma about the building that looks similar to the game Jenga. ‘It’s a unique building method.’ Kuma used ordinary, affordable and locally-sourced timber blocks of uniform thickness and by piling them up he create an organic building reminiscent of a forest. Asymmetry prevents the design from appearing blocky, while limiting the points of contact with the ground gives the wood an unexpected lightness, as though it is growing upwards.
  
  The idea of using as little material as possible in order to create an organic and fluid space was already developed in earlier works. Only glass walls separate the piles of timber inside from those outside. The design is intended to be light on the environment, too. The timber has not been treated or worked, hence it can be easily dissembled or recycled