Calyon Japan Office
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At a glance
- Project by: Dasic Architects
- Location: Shiodome, Tokyo, Japan
Preview image
© Peter Cook
Project images
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Reception © Peter Cook View project image |
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Foyer © Peter Cook View project image |
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Vectogramm © Peter Cook View project image |
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Rooms © Peter Cook View project image |
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Sunlight © Peter Cook View project image |
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Boardroom © Peter Cook View project image |
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Boardroom with AV box closed © Peter Cook View project image |
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Boardroom with AV box open © Peter Cook View project image |
Architect's statement
Program
Calyon Company was created by the merger of the French banking groups, Credit Agricole and Credit Lyonnais in 2003. Following the merger the management considered how best to integrate their operations in Japan and came to the conclusion was that it required a new, high quality building with all the infrastructure geared to serve an investment banking requirements. The building selected was the new Sumitomo Building in Shiodome business area in central Tokyo.
The Program called for a trading room, back office; communications rooms, clients and conference center, reception area plus associated infrastructure.
The layout and the positions of the important spaces were dictated by unique position of the building. On one side it looks on central Tokyo with Mount Fuji silhouette on the horizon. In the evening it is often possible to see amazing purple or blood red sunsets. On the other side it looks on to Hama-rikyu Park, which is regarded as one of the finest example of Edo-period Japanese Gardens in Tokyo
Concept
The program called for a large number of rooms organized around internal corridors. We began to think of the "corridors" as "streets" and of the rooms being physically separated as "buildings". Investment banking requires confidentiality and this solution also led to the elimination of sound leakage from adjacent rooms as well as drastically limiting noise transfer through the air conditioning systems.
As a result we started viewing the spaces as a free standing "glass objects" with its interconnected play of forms and proportions. This led to an extensive "play" of moving "objects" around the plate in order to find an ideal solution which would satisfy two main objective: (1) Functional hierarchy of the required spaces and (2) Proportional relations between different "objects".
We decided that the overall design aesthetic would be based on elegance, minimalism and light. Furthermore one of our main design principal was bringing together French and Japanese design aesthetics. This very quickly moved us to a next level where we start looking at how would this places look and function during a day and how during a night. We started thinking what would be the lighting concept. Very soon these boxes with their minimalist simple forms started reminded us of Japanese paper lanterns – "chochin". This led us to set up a concept where the rooms have all the necessary lighting inside while all the corridors and "public" spaces are lit only by the light generate d by the translucent walls of the rooms.
New Technologies
While looking for the materials to use for the walls we came across a new, intriguing technology developed by a small but creative German company from Darmstadt, P+P Holzbau, called Vectogramm. It is a technology which allows an image (text, picture, drawing…) to be digitally transferred to a special "cutting" mechanism which can engrave those images o n to almost any surface. We got together with a Darmstadt based architect Stefan Ochs who has pioneered Vectogramm use in Germany and asked him to assist us in developing our design.
We develop a concept where all the surfaces would be "imprinted" with a "pattern", a kind of "digital wall paper". In a way this brought to us a kind of French baroque aesthetic in to our already developed Japanese felling of light and minimalism. The motif we selected was based on the ivy that covers so many houses in Paris.
New Materials
We selected three different sets of materials as principal covers for all the walls and surfaces. Some of them are used in Japan for the very first time (like Vectogramm). The materials were:
- Acrylic and glass – used for all the meeting and conference rooms thus allowing light transparency.
- Aluminum clad Resoplan – used on all solid surfaces (mainly for "re - cladding" the building corridors). All of the Resoplan is grey monochromatic while the staff break room is green (which apart for giving a more relax ed atmosphere makes a connection with the Hama-rikyu gardens visible from the window ).
- Black colored Sasmox – for solid walls inside the client's area and for "enclosing" the VC rooms. It creates an intriguing feeling of "black box" being encased in to a glass box.
All of those materials have a Vectogramm pattern engraved on them.
Lighting
A ring of museum lighting system was placed all around room perimeters and right above the acrylic Vectogramm walls. This plays a role of a "directional light" for the engraving allowing for the images to be visible under different light intensity depending on the relation between the angle of eye and the lighting.
Furthermore the museum ceiling ring (whose perimeter is framed by the same glass that is the outer perimeter of the room) creates a feeling that rooms have a natural sun right above them, opening up the solid ceiling.
All the doors have a specially designed aluminum clad lighting frame. The lighting fixture inside the frame is connected to the motion sensor inside the room. When the room is empty the door lighting is switched off. Upon entering a room, one activates the motion sensor, which activates the frame light to switch on. The light remains switched on as long as the rooms are occupied th us efficiently allowing staff outside in the corridors to easy pinpoint occupied and un - occupied rooms.
Art
The fact that majority of the rooms had no solid walls on which one could place a traditional art prompted us to look for a more suitable and less conventional forms. The works are printed on large canvas sheets, suspended inside the rooms. The large areas of canvas also act as an acoustic damper inside the rooms, helping with sound resonance (the walls being glass - clad acrylic).
The artist chosen was Peter Cook, a Tokyo based photographer who creates monochromatic images of buildings and cities. The centerpiece is a combination of two large triptychs in the Boardroom. France is represented by I. M. Pei's Louvre pyramid in Paris. Japan is represented by Kenzo Tange's Tokyo City Hall in Shinjuku. This structure is also directly visible from the window completing the transition from France to Japan.
Finishes
- Floors: Granite / Carpet
- Walls: Vectogramm (Acrylic, Resoplan, Sasmox, Aluminum) / Paint / Glass
- Ceilings: Paint
Details/Credits
- Location: Sumitomo Building L15-L16, Shiodome, Tokyo, Japan
- Site area: 5, 000 m2
- Design: March 2004 - Jun 2004
- Construction: July 2004 - November 2004
- Project Team Dasic Architects: George Dasic; Shunichi Tajima; Benigna Iwasak i, Reiko Fukushi and Tamaki Suzuki
- Client: Calyon Japan (Credit Agricole + Credit Lyonnais)
- Project Manager: John Lang LaSalle – Koji Takenaka
- Associate Architect: Ochs Architekten - Stefan Ochs
- M&E engineers: PT Morimura – K. Ishiwatari, E. Maddison, D, Austin
- IT: PTS – Jonathan Senycia
- AV engineers: Eizo System
- Construction: Sumitomo R&D (Kajima Corp. – Lead Contractor); Garde USP – Interior Contractor
- Vectogramm: P+P Holzbau Gmbh - Thomas Poth
- Art: Peter Cook, Tokyo
- Photography: Peter Cook, Tokyo
