Yusuhara Community Library / YURURI Yusuhara ©Kawasumi・Kobayashi Kenji Photograph Office
Japan 2018

Yusuhara Community Library / Yururi Yusuhara

2018.10
Kochi
Residential | Civic | Gallery/Museum/Cultural
Completed
1,931
2F / 1BF

Yusuhara, a town on the border of Kochi and Ehime, is often described as a “village above the clouds”. We established a compound of buildings here including library and welfare facilities using mainly cedar, which was sourced from the town.

With a sports facility and daycare center across the lawn, the site has become the heart of the town, promoting exchange and communication between generations of locals.

We assembled the structure mixing steel and cedar, expressing a forest with sunlight filtering through the leaves. We also created an undulating ground rather than a large flat floor, and the raised ground can be used as a stage for events such as lectures or concerts.

In the library, everyone takes their shoes off feeling the warmth of the cedar floor, and reading books anywhere in the space.

At the welfare center facing the library, Rogier Uitenboogaart, developed a washi mixed with bark of Yusuhara trees. It’s applied on the walls of the welfare facility producing a comfortable and warm space.

Team Kazuhiko Miyazawa, Kuniaki Tanaka, Tomoko Sasaki*, Erika Mikami, Keisuke Narisawa Cooperation Jun Sato Structural Engineers Facility 掛水環境研究所 Accumulation Futaba Quantity Surveyors Others KS Sekkei Award The 18th Public Buildings Award of Excellence (Cultural Facilities) (Yusuhara Community Library / Yururi Yusuhara), 第三十七回 日本図書館協会建築賞 Publication Nikkei Architecture 2023/04/13 No.1237 , DETAIL 2020/6 summer issue No.225 , Kindai Kenchiku 2018/10 Vol.72 , Shinkenchiku 2018/10 , GA JAPAN 154 , GA JAPAN 154 , GA JAPAN 140 Photography ©︎ Kawasumi-Kobayashi Kenji Photograph Office