Zhongjie(2011)Nakagin

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ZHONGJIE LIN

University of North Carolina at Charlotte

Nakagin Capsule TowerRevisiting the Future of the Recent

Past

The debates surrounding the proposed demolition of Kisho Kurokawa’s Nakagin Capsule Tower

provide a unique opportunity to re-examine Metabolism’s historic role in postwar modernism and its

influence on contemporary architecture. Although one can argue that contradictions between urban

development and architectural conservation are a commonplace characteristic of the contemporarymetropolis, the intense conflict between redevelopment and conservation in Japan is emblematic of

an enduring cultural attitude toward urban change that relies upon a paradoxical relationship

between transformation and continuity. This distinctly Japanese cultural attitude underlies Metabolist

urban theory and informs the design of the Nakagin Capsule Tower. The building was an experimental

project meant to support a new postwar lifestyle and facilitate change and renewal in an increasingly

dynamic urban fabric. In many ways, the ideas and values that created the Nagakin Capsule Tower are

the same ideas and values that are threatening to destroy it. An examination of the building’s recent

past and possible futures reveals the complex legacy of Metabolism’s unfulfilled urban visions.

IntroductionIn April 2007, a brief report on Architectural

Record’s online journal drew worldwide attention to

a building in Tokyo: ‘‘Kurokawa’s Nakagin Capsule

Tower to Be Razed.’’1

This news astonished manyreaders because the Nakagin building is not only an

icon of postwar modern architecture in Japan but

also represents a rare and arguably the finest built

work resulting from the historic Metabolist

movement. Completed in 1972, the building

consists of two interconnected towers at eleven and

thirteen stories, respectively, supporting a total of

144 interchangeable ‘‘capsules’’ in the size and

shape of a shipping container. Each capsule houses

a self-contained residential unit attached to one of the towers with flexible joints, showcasing the

essential Metabolist idea of adaptability and

replaceability (Figure 1). Nakagin Capsule Tower

was listed as an architectural heritage site by

DoCoMoMo in 2006, but no concrete measure has

been taken to protect the building, and its interior

has fallen into disrepair despite its continuous use

as a residential building (Figure 2). Concerns have

also been raised among its residents about the

health issues related to the use of asbestos on the

capsules and the building’s ability to withstand

earthquakes.2 These concerns prompted the

property owners to vote to tear down the CapsuleTower and replace it with a new fourteen-story

tower, despite a popular campaign launched by

Kisho Kurokawa to save the building.3

The campaign to save Nakagin Capsule Tower

coincides with a renewed interest in postwar avant-

garde movements and a growing appreciation of the

Metabolists’ futuristic design concepts and dynamic

forms.The Metabolists’ work first became known to

the world through a few articles by Günter Nitschke in

Architectural Design in 1964 and Reyner Banham’s1976 Megastructure.4 Banham associated

Metabolism with the other megastructural

movements in the West between the mid-1950s and

early 1970s.Writing in the aftermath of the 1968

worldwide student uprisings and the 1973 energy

crisis that led to the surge of environmental

movements and social activism, Banham used an

ironic subtitle, Urban Futures of the Recent Past ,

implying that these ambitious megastructural

concepts were no longer relevant to contemporary

architecture and cities. He wrote: ‘‘For the two

decades of its maximum potency, it was also,

probably, the hinge of a crisis in architectural thinkingthat may also prove to have been the terminal crisis

of ‘Modern’ architecture as we have known it.’’5

These megastructural movements, despite

Banham’s assertion, have been re-examined and

revived in recent years by architectural scholars and

institutions. In 2002, the Royal Institute of British

Architects awarded a RIBA Gold Medal to

Archigram, indicating a remarkable turnaround in

attitude toward this avant-garde group, one no less

ironic considering Archigram’s early rebellion againstestablished institutions and practices.6 This

recognition was soon followed by a series of

publications and exhibitions on those postwar

megastructural movements featured in Banham’s

book.7 These publications and exhibitions focus

mainly on reconstructing the histories of these

megastructural movements and reinterpreting their

architectural and urban theories as well as their

13 LIN Journal of Architectural Education,

pp. 13–32 ª 2011 ACSA



1. Kisho Kurokawa, Nakagin Capsule Tower, 1972 (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & A ssociates).

Nakagin Capsule Tower 14



political implications in the postwar context.

However, the threat of demolition of Nakagin

Capsule Tower indicates that the discourse must be

extended to the level of specific artifacts to

examine these visionary concepts and their impact

on contemporary urbanism and architecture.

The controversy surrounding Kurokawa’s

building raises a number of questions about the

legacy of the Metabolist movement in Japan andelsewhere, along with related questions about

preservation practice. Was the Metabolist movement

a regional variation of the postwar fascination with

megastructure, or was it a distinctly Japanese

movement that worked across many scales? Should

Metabolist buildings be preserved, given the

movement’s explicit celebration of continuous

change and adaptability? And, despite the failed

promises of many Metabolist proposals, should

Metabolist ideas inform contemporary design andconservation? In other words, what is the real

legacy of Metabolism?

Through a discussion of the Nakagin Capsule

Tower’s past, present, and possible future, this

article will address these questions from both an

architectural and urban perspective. I will argue that

the rationale for the preservation of the Nakagin

Capsule Tower lies in its ability to link an architectural

idea—the capsule, a form of prefabrication—to

Metabolism’s unfulfilled urban visions. On the

architectural scale, I investigate the original

Metabolist ideas leading to the design of the tower

and examine how these ideas advanced architectural

innovations in terms of module and prefabrication.

On the urban scale, I want to contest Banham’s

generalized view of megastructure and demonstrate

that the idea of Metabolism was not only rooted inthe particular Japanese tradition and urban culture

but also embodies multiple paradigms of urbanism,

namely, megastructure, group form, and ruins.Two

of the paradigms—group form and ruins—in fact

offer alternatives to the megastructure concept,

although all three models grew from the central

Metabolist notion of the city as an organism. While a

Metabolist city was never entirely realized and the

attempts to translate Metabolist form into built

projects often failed, the Metabolist notion of urbantransformation and renewal has important lessons for

contemporary architects and urbanists.

Revisiting the Metabolist idea of the city as an

organism in transformation offers new insights into

the dilemmas associated with the conservation of

modern architecture. The Nakagin Capsule Tower is

among a number of notable modern buildings

threatened for demolition in Japan in recent years.

Although one can argue that conflicts between

urban development and architectural conservation

are a commonplace characteristic of the

contemporary metropolis, the Japanese context has

accentuated the contradiction between the growthof cities and the impulse to preserve historical fabric

and landmarks. The notoriously high cost of land in

Japanese cities has directly impacted these

demolition decisions. On a more fundamental level,

however, intense conflict between redevelopment

and conservation is emblematic of an enduring

cultural attitude toward urban change and

regeneration in Japan, an issue with even more

relevance after the incredible disruption of the

March 2011 earthquake. This attitude in factunderlay Metabolist urban theory, and Nakagin

Capsule Tower was an experimental project that

intended to facilitate change and renewal through

periodic replacement of capsule housing units. In

other words, the ideas and values that created the

Nagakin Capsule Tower are, to a large extent, the

same ideas and values that are threatening to

destroy it. One has to take into consideration this

relationship when discussing any proposals for

saving the Tower or attempting to re-evaluate theMetabolist movement. Looking through the lens of

Nakagin Capsule Tower, its history, and current debates

about its likely destruction, this paper tries to

provide a focused yet more integrated understanding

of the legacy of the Metabolist project.

The Metabolist MovementThe Metabolist movement was launched in 1960,

when a group of young architects and designers

published their radical manifesto Metabolism: TheProposals for New Urbanism at the World Design

Conference in Tokyo.8 Besides Kurokawa, the

founders of the Metabolist group included architects

Kiyonari Kikutake, Masato Otaka, and Fumihiko

Maki, architectural critic Noboru Kawazoe, industrial

designer Ekuan Kenji, and graphic designer Kiyoshi

Awazu.They chose the name ‘‘metabolism’’ for the

group because it indicated a fundamental idea

2. Damaged ceiling in Nakagin Capsule Tower (Photo taken in 2009 by author).

15 LIN



shared among these architects and designers—a

particular biotechnical notion of the ‘‘city as an

organic process,’’ which stood in opposition to the

modernist paradigm of city design as a machinic

system.This perspective was made clear in theintroductory statement of the manifesto:

Metabolism is the name of the group, in which

each member proposes future designs of our

coming world through his concrete designs and

illustrations. We regard human society as a

vital process—a continuous development from

atom to nebula.The reason why we use such a

biological word, metabolism, is that we believe

design and technology should be a denotationof human society. We are not going to accept

metabolism as a natural historical process, but

try to encourage active metabolic development

of our society through our proposals.9

In their theoretical urban projects, the

Metabolists often envisioned the sea and the sky as

human habitats of the future, and they proposed

that a city would grow, transform, and die like an

organism. To accommodate the growth andregeneration of the modern city, they called for

establishing a system of urban design distinguishing

elements of different scales and durations, namely,

the ‘‘permanent element’’ such as urban

infrastructure, versus the ‘‘transient element’’ such

as individual houses. Responding to the distinct

‘‘metabolic cycles’’ in the city, the Metabolists’

designs were often characterized by the

combination of a megastructure, serving as the

permanent base, and numerous individual unitsattached to the megastructure and subject to more

frequent replacement. For instance, Kikutake’s

Marine City featured numerous standardized

housing units clipped onto a few enormous

ferroconcrete cylindrical towers. The towers serving

as the main structure of the city would grow as

population increased, and the individual living pods

would conduct periodical self-renewal (Figure 3).

3. Kiyonori Kikutake, Marine City, 1959. Model photo (Photo courtesy of Kiyonori Kikutake).




As a dramatic representation of the Metabolists’concept of city as process, this combination of

megastructure and cell became the trademark of

their architecture.

Although they never became formal members

of the group, Kenzo Tange and Arata Isozaki were

also actively involved in the Metabolist movement.

Tange especially was acknowledged as the mentor

of the Metabolist architects and virtually the

creator of the group because of his position aschair of the programs committee of the World

Design Conference. In fact, the program committee

was eventually reorganized to become the

Metabolism group. Tange’s Plan for Tokyo, also

completed in 1960, represented a sophisticated

synthesis of Metabolist ideas on a grand scale

(Figure 4). Featuring a linear series of interlocking

loops that spanned the city across Tokyo Bay, this

plan served as a polemical alternative to the official

plans of Tokyo and proposed to fundamentally

transform the urban structure of this megacity.10

The Metabolists sought an alternative social

order for the world through these proposals forrestructuring rapidly expanding cities. Their design

concepts were full of political implications, often

based on a modern vision of collective society.

Metabolism was often associated with other avant-

garde movements in the 1950s and 1960s, such as

Team 10, the Archigram in Great Britain, the Groupe

d’Etudes d’Architecture Mobile (GEAM) led by Yona

Friedman in France, and Superstudio in Italy.

Rebelling against the status quo of urban

reconstruction in the postwar era, these architect-urbanists shared an interest in three-dimensional

urban structure as the framework for urban growth,

and they wanted to revolutionize the way the

modern city was built and operated. Owing to the

vast scale and utopian nature of these projects, it

was not surprising that very few of the

megastructural schemes were realized.

With the advent of an energy crisis in the early

1970s and the rise of environmental movements,

megastructure’s popularity among architects,planners, and potential clients waned.11 In 1976,

when Reyner Banham documented these utopian

movements in Megastructure: Urban Future of the

Recent Past , he called the megastructures

‘‘dinosaurs of the modern movement,’’ referring not

only to their enormous scale but also implying that

they had by then become extinct as a ‘‘species.’’12

Metabolism was no exception. Banham criticized

the ‘‘mind-numbing simplicity’’ of the Metabolists’

theoretical program and accused Tange’s Tokyo Bayproject of having a ‘‘destructive influence’’ on the

French and Italian megastructural projects.13

Indeed, the Metabolists’ urban ideas were only

realized, somewhat symbolically, in a small number

of building projects, such as Tange’s Yamanashi

Press and Broadcasting Center built in 1967 and

Kurokawa’s Nakagin Capsule Tower. Nevertheless,

Banham recognized that through the Metabolist

4. Kenzo Tange, Plan for Tokyo, 1960. Model photo (Photo courtesy of Tange Associates).

17 LIN



projects and the Metabolist manifesto,

megastructure had become an important tool to

‘‘make a unique Japanese contribution to modern

architecture’’ and led Japanese architecture to a

higher degree of maturity and independence of

other cultures’ ‘‘neo-colonialist’’ views by exploiting

new construction technologies.14

Design and Construction of the NakaginCapsule TowerBanham does not mention particular examples of

the innovation in construction technologies he

found praiseworthy in the work of the Metabolists.

However, the development of advanced

prefabrication construction techniques, such as the

capsule technology used in Kurokawa’s Nagakin

Capsule Tower, would have been known to him.

Kurokawa began his exploration of capsule

architecture at the 1970 World Exposition in Osaka

through the design of the Takara Beautilion, which

became one of the most popular architectural

fantasies at the Expo (Figure 5). The building

consisted of a three-dimensional framework of

steel pipes and a number of prefabricated cubic

capsules clad in stainless steel and installed in the

framework with connectors.The capsules houseddisplays of the Takara Corporation’s beauty

products. The framework terminated at opened

joints, giving the building an unusual silhouette

and suggesting the incompleteness and

expandability of the structure. Kurokawa took full

advantage of the technology of prefabrication,

making possible instant assembly of the

structure and installation of capsules. In fact, the

Takara Beautilion was put together on site in only

six days.

The Takara Beautilion, along with most other

structures at Osaka Expo, was demolished after the

end of the event, but the Expo effect lingered.Torizo Watanabe, then president of the real estate

firm Nakagin Co., visited Osaka Expo and was so

impressed by the Takara Beautilion that he decided

to retain the architect to design a capsule building

for permanent use. Watanabe conceived of this

development not as a conventional condominium

but rather a new form of work ⁄ live space for urban

dwellers. A specific sale policy was implemented

to target small or medium business owners and

high-level employees who already owned a house orapartment and wanted a space in Tokyo’s center city

as a studio or for occasional overnight stays.

Kurokawa also claimed that: ‘‘The Capsules are

housing for homo movens: people on the move.’’15

His design responded to the emergence of ‘‘urban

nomads’’ and the increasing mobility characterizing

an emerging global city. The location of the Nakagin

Building at bustling Giza central business district

made it suitable for this purpose (Figure 6).16

This idea of impermanence and movabilityoriginating in Metabolism’s concept of the city

influenced every step of the design and

construction of Nakagin Capsule Tower. According

to their different ‘‘metabolic cycles,’’ Kurokawa

configured the building with three basic

components: the permanent structure

(two ferroconcrete shafts), the moveable elements

(144 capsules), and the service equipment

(utilities). Their designed were based on different

life spans. Kurokawa envisioned that the mainshafts would last at least sixty years, while the

capsules would be due for replacement in twenty-

five to thirty-five years. He noted that the life span

of the capsule was not a mechanical one, but rather

a social one, implying that changing human needs

and social relationships would necessitate such

periodic replacement.17 The towers, containing

circulation and service spaces, are connected to

5. Kisho Kurokawa, Takara Beautilion, 1970 (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).




each other via outdoor bridges every three floors

and serve as vertical ‘‘artificial land,’’ upon which

capsules are installed. The utility pipelines are

attached to the outside of the capsules.The towers

rise to different heights, and the capsules are

arranged in a seemingly random pattern, suggesting

an ongoing process: the shaft could grow and more

capsules could be piled up. Kurokawa regarded this

incomplete look as the ‘‘esthetic of time,’’ referring

to Metabolism’s central notion of the city as process

(Figures 7 and 8).18

Each capsule is tied to one of the concrete

cores with only four high-tension bolts: two each on

the upper and lower sides.That means that every

unit is removable and, by updating the capsules, the

whole system would be renewed. The capsule

measures 7.5 · 12.5 · 7 foot and is built of a

lightweight, welded steel frame—identical to a

shipping container in structure and size—andcovered with galvanized rib-reinforced steel panels

finished with a coat of Kenitex glossy spray. There is

a Plexiglas porthole window on each capsule, 4¼

foot in diameter. Because of the capsule’s distinct

form, Charles Jencks jokingly described the building

as ‘‘super-imposed washing machines’’ (Figures 9

and 10).19

The interior of the capsule was also designed

using industrial technologies. A variety of

installations were built into an extremely compactspace: an integrated bathroom unit at a corner, a

bed underneath the window, and appliances and

cabinets along the other wall including a color

television set, a refrigerator, a kitchen stove, an air

conditioner, a telephone, a stereo, an air cleaner, a

table light, a clock, and a desk calculator. The aim

was to provide basic space and outfitting to support

the lifestyle of a modern urban person in the city.

When the capsules were sold in 1972, their prices

ranged from $12,300 to $14,600, about the cost of a luxury car of the time.20

Construction took place in separate locations,

both on-site and off-site.The only on-site

construction was the two towers and space for

utilities and equipment. Capsules were prefabricated

and assembled in another city by a manufacturer

that produced railroad vehicles and vessels. After

transport to the building site, they were hoisted by

crane and fastened to the concrete shafts starting

from the bottom up. Each capsule was installedindependently and cantilevered from the shaft so

that it could be removed without affecting others.

The construction of the entire Nakagin Capsule

Tower took only a year (Figures 11 and 12).

Saving the Future of the Recent PastWhen Nakagin Capsule Tower was unveiled in 1972,

Japan Architect dedicated the entire October 1972

6. Model of Nakagin Capsule Tower indicating possibility of expansion (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

7. Typical plan of Nakagin Capsule Tower (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

19 LIN



issue to capsule architecture, featuring Kurokawa’s

building, discussing its potential impact, and

projecting an optimistic future for capsule

architecture. As the world’s first fully built capsule

building, Nakagin Capsule Tower introduced anumber of revolutionary ideas in design. It helped

establish a new building type, the capsule hotel,

that provided a compact and efficient

accommodation unique to Japanese cities.

Furthermore, some portions of the design of

Nakagin Capsule Tower later made their way into

industrial products, such as the prefabricated

integrated bathroom. Kurokawa envisioned the

capsule building as a new prototype for

prefabricated housing that would unleash the powerof mass production in urban settings. However, this

vision was not realized because of the high costs of

the innovative construction and the small,

standardized units that only accommodated the

needs of a single person. In the thirty-nine years

since its construction, Nakagin Capsule Tower

became more or less a monolithic and static icon in

the midst of the bustling and fast changing Giza

district, commemorating the ideal of a metabolic

city but no longer participating in its processes(Figure 13).

Kurokawa designed the capsules to have a

twenty-five to thirty-five year lifespan. Ironically,

contemporary cities like Tokyo are growing and

transforming so rapidly that their change outpaces

the generational ‘‘metabolism’’ envisioned by the

Metabolists, and change at this pace operates on

the scale of the entire building instead of

components, such as the capsules. Hence, the plan

to demolish the Capsule Tower—and it is not anisolated case. In fact, a few famous Metabolist

buildings have been torn down in the last decade

even though they were still in sound condition. In

2006, Kurokawa lost his Sony Tower, Nakagin

Capsule Tower’s sister building in Osaka. Kikutake’s

Sofitel Tokyo, a 1994 building characterized by a

dynamic form emblematic of the architect’s concept

of ‘‘Tree-shaped Community,’’ was torn down in

8. Section of Nakagin Capsule Tower (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).




2007 after only thirteen years of service(Figure 14). Going back a little further, Tange’s

iconic Tokyo City Hall in Marunouchi district,

completed in 1957, was demolished in 1992 to

make room for Rafael Viñoly’s Tokyo International

Forum after a new city hall—also by Tange—had

been erected in Shinjuku in 1991.

Extremely high land costs in major Japanese

cities and the constant desire to maximize land

value have driven the decisions to tear down each

of these examples of the Metabolist legacy.According to historian Botand Bognar, the average

construction cost of a building in a large city in

Japan accounts for only about 10 percent of the

land on which it sits; this results in more

renovations and redevelopments in Japan than in

most other nations.21 Landmark buildings

designed by renowned architects are no exception.

The Metabolist buildings were hit particularly hard

because, paradoxically, the rigorousmegastructure-capsule distinctions offer little

flexibility in terms of occupancy and structural

expansion. In addition, because the Metabolist

architects expressed each capsule on the façade

to represent the individuality of their occupants,

the floor ⁄ area ratios of Metabolist buildings are

often below average, making them less

economically viable. In fact, the new fourteen-

story building being proposed to replace Nakagin

Capsule Tower would generate 60 percent moresquare footage.

Anticipating the necessity of renewal and

upgrade of the capsules after thirty years of use,

Kisho Kurokawa Architects & Associates has been

working on a ‘‘Nakagin Capsule Tower Renovation

Plan’’ since 1998. The plan proposes updating

service equipment and replacing capsules with new

units while keeping the structural shafts intact

(Figures 15 and 16). By so doing, the building

would undergo self-renewal as the architect

originally envisioned. Measured at around 14 by 9

and 8 foot in height, the new capsule would be

slightly larger than the existing one, and it would nolonger include built-in furnishing, except a

prefabricated bathroom. Kurokawa argued that

replacing the capsules would be more cost-efficient

than tearing down the tower and building a new

one. The property owners’ association, however,

remained unconvinced and has continued to pursue

a complete redevelopment.

When the property owners’ redevelopment

plan was made public in 2007, Kurokawa launched

a campaign to save the Tower in the last year of his life.22 He argued forcefully against the

demolition plan and implied a conspiracy by citing

the involvement of some American hedge fund in

this redevelopment. His interviews were widely

disseminated through both traditional media and

Internet blogs, and he appealed directly to various

architectural communities. Several major

architectural organizations in Japan, including the

Japan Institute of Architects, the Japan Federation

of Architects and Building Engineers Associations,and DoCoMoMo Japan, unanimously endorsed

Kurokawa’s plan to protect the building and his

renovation proposal.23 Kurokawa also received

enormous support from the international

community of architects and designers. According

to a poll of over 10,000 architects from a hundred

countries by London-based World Architecture

News, 95 percent voted to preserve the building

and 75 percent voted to support Kurokawa’s idea

of replacing the capsules.24

The overwhelmingsupport from the profession indicates a general

acknowledgment of Nakagin Capsule Tower as an

architectural artifact with valuable cultural

heritage.

Architects contributing to the polls of World

Architecture News were excited about the idea of

replacing the Nakagin Building’s capsules, which,

for them, could test ‘‘what is possible with

9. Axonometric of a Capsule (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

21 LIN



modularization.’’25 The growing interest in the

design of this building and other works by the

Metabolists was also manifested in a few

high-profiled exhibitions and art reviews. The

exhibition called ‘‘Home Delivery: Fabricating theModern Dwelling’’ at the Museum of Modern Art in

2008 included a model of the Capsule Tower and

praised it as ‘‘representing the whole world of

architectural thoughts in the 1960s from the

Metabolist group in Japan.’’26 The New York Times

architectural critic Nicolai Ouroussoff summed up its

significance after visiting the building: ‘‘The Capsule

Tower is not only gorgeous architecture; like all

great buildings, it is the crystallization of a far-

reaching cultural ideal. Its existence also stands as apowerful reminder of paths not taken, of the

possibility of worlds shaped by different sets of

values.’’27

The widespread and vocal support for

preserving the Nakagin Building aligns with a

notable shift in architectural history and criticism.

Opinions regarding architectural avant-gardes of the

1960s, including Team 10, Archigram, Super Studio,

Yona Friedman, and Metabolism, have changed

considerably if subtly in recent years.Megastructural projects arising from these avant-

garde movements were often dismissed in the past

as technological fantasies and politically naïve ideas

about social progress, or, more critically, as

authoritarian gestures to control the development

of architecture and society with a fixed set of urban

design concepts executed at an inhuman scale.

Recent historic accounts situate these architectural

and urban experiments back in their respective

historic contexts and view these radical ideas andprojects more as alternatives to rigid mainstream

modernism on the one hand and nostalgic

postmodernism and New Urbanism on the other.28

The renewed interest in the Metabolist movement

and the effort to preserve Nagakin Capsule Tower

prompt us to re-examine the legacies of this

movement and what they mean to contemporary

practices of design and conservation.

10. Kurokawa in a Capsule (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).




Continuity through Transformation: A NewAttitude toward Historic PreservationThe drastically different opinions of the

architectural professionals and the property owners

regarding the Nakagin Capsule Tower’s future

reflect a profound conflict between the values of a

cultural elite and the logics of local market

economies. The Tokyo real estate market and

Japanese urban culture have intensified thisconflict and created distinct conservation practices.

For instance, because of the financial disadvantage

of keeping a historic building on its original site as a

physical archive, some valuable historic structures in

Japan have been relocated to remote sites to create

open-air architectural museums. Meiji Village is one

such open-air museum. Located about fifteen miles

outside Nagoya, Meiji Village has gathered

over sixty historic buildings from Japan’s Meiji

(1868–1912), Taisho (1912–1926), and early Showa

(1926–1945) periods, which are rearranged in a

landscaped setting. Among these buildings is the

lobby of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Imperial Hotel. No

plan for this kind of open-air museum, however, has

been developed for the conservation of post-WWII

modern architecture.

Also notable is the relative silence of the publicagents in the heated debate regarding the future of

the tower. Although the Japanese government and

the UNESCO World Heritage can intervene to save a

modern building, no government agency or NGO

has taken action to date.29 Japan has been known

for its great system of National Treasures and

Important Cultural Properties, which manifests the

nation’s dedication to preserving cultural artifacts.30

While one could speculate that a failure to

understand the historic value of Kurokawa’s building

could influence the government’s indifference to its

conservation, a more likely explanation for the lack

of official interest lies in the character of modernJapanese cities and in the Japanese understanding

of cultural heritage. Japanese cities like Tokyo are

notorious for their extraordinary pace of change. As

John Thackara observed, ‘‘[In Japan] buildings are

designed in the expectation not that they will stand

the test of time but that they will be torn down

sooner rather than later and replaced by something

more appropriate to the economic and technological

demands of the future.’’31 As a result, Tokyo

remains a ‘‘brand new’’ city: most of its buildingswere built or rebuilt after World War II and,

according to the statistics, it continues to replace

roughly 30 percent of its structures every ten

years.32

Contributing to this attitude toward historical

preservation is an acceptance of constant

transformation of the physical environment, which

has been absorbed into Japanese consciousness.

Japanese culture has evolved with this notion of

impermanence. This notion has been represented inits ultimate form through an extraordinary practice

of periodic reconstruction of Ise Shrine. Every

twenty years, the main sanctuary of this Shinto

shrine is torn down and a new one is built on an

immediately adjacent site in an almost identical

form. This ritual reconstruction, known as shikinen-

zokan, was initiated over one thousand three

hundred years ago to express the deepest ideas of

Shintoism, a faith in the necessity of periodic

renewal following the law of Nature.33

The historiccontinuity is paradoxically preserved through such

symbolic rebuilding, which celebrates the idea of

transformation and regeneration.

The awareness of a paradoxical relationship

between transformation and continuity influenced

the Metabolists as well as other Japanese architects.

This particular Japanese context is manifest in a

book on Ise written by Tange and Kawazoe in 1962

11. Building the frame of a capsule (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

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12. Construction of Nakagin Capsule Tower (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).




entitled Ise: Prototype of Japanese Architecture,

which called for reinterpretation of Ise’s traditionalprinciple in modern design. Responding to the

contemporary urban conditions characterized by

rapid expansion and unpredictable change, the

Metabolists moved away from the Modernist

approach to planning. Rather than providing a

Modernist machinic layout of the city’s

development, the Metabolists called for patterns

‘‘which can be followed consistently from present

into the distant future.’’34 In fact, when the biologic

concept of ‘‘metabolism’’ was introduced to Japan,it was translated as shinchin taisha. This Japanese

phrase not only carries the physiologic meaning that

it has in English but also embodies the idiomatic

meaning of ‘‘out with the old, in with the new’’ in

the Chinese and Japanese languages. It refers to a

broader sense of transformation not only related to

animals or human bodies but also associated with

the world at large. Therefore, it is not surprising that

the architects chose this term as their manifesto,

because from their point of view, architecture andcity could only be sustained through constant

renewal—a process, they believed, as important as

metabolism to an organism.

The same notion of continuity through

transformation influences the Japanese attitude

toward historic conservation. As historian Nyozekan

Hasegawa argues, the importance of tradition in

Japan ‘‘lies not so much in preserving the cultural

properties of the past as in giving shape to

contemporary culture; not in the retention of thingsas they were, but in the way certain … qualities

inherent in them live on in the contemporary

culture.’’35 Kurokawa’s proposal to preserve the

Nakagin Capsule Tower speaks to this attitude.

Through the replacement of capsules, the architect

challenges the prevalent Western concept of heritage

founded on an understanding of the monument as

permanent object fixed in time and specific to site.

Should Kurokawa’s renovation plan be carried out

and the capsules be replaced, it no longer would be

‘historic’ in the Western sense, as it would no longer

be original. In Japan, however, this transformation of

the Tower would conform to an understanding of heritage based on the belief that eternity is

sustained by change.

Three Metabolist Urban ParadigmsWhile most Metabolist projects adopted a

megastructural strategy, two alternative paradigms

of urban design also arose within the Metabolist

movement: Fumihiko Maki’s idea of ‘‘group form’’

and Arata Isozaki’s concept of ‘‘ruins.’’ Sharing the

notion of the city as process instead of artifact, theideas of megastructure, group form, and ruins all

address Japan’s constantly changing urban

environment from different perspectives, and each

has had an impact on contemporary urbanism.

With another Metabolist Masato Otaka, Maki

introduced the concept of ‘‘group form’’ in the

essay ‘‘Towards the Group Form’’ published in the

Metabolist manifesto. Maki was critical of the

utopian idea of megastructure and proposed group

form as an alternative, which he defined morecoherently in his Investigations in Collective Form

published in 1964.36 In contrast to megastructure’s

hierarchical organization prioritizing the major

structure over individual units, Maki suggested that

order should arise from grouping individual

elements together. Such order is based on the

relationship between part and whole as often seen

in the formation of vernacular settlements like

Italian hill towns, North African villages, and

Japanese linear villages: individual units aregenerative elements defined by a prototype, which

determines the general character of the ensemble.

Group form allows the ensemble to grow and renew

itself without affecting its general character as the

system maintains a dynamic equilibrium. The

emphasis of design therefore shifts from a physical

structure to a perceptual order underlying the

evolution of the city.

13. Elevations of Nakagin Capsule Tower (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

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Maki contended that group form would create

a flexible urban system more responsive to the

fluctuating conditions of contemporary society.

In contrast to conventional top-down planning,

group form encourages cumulative growth that

results in a non-hierarchical collective image. The

Hillside Terrace, arguably the most engaging urban

project in Maki’s career, provides a remarkable

example of this idea (Figure 17). Commissioned by

the Asakura family, the project is in fact a series

consisting of mixed residential, commercial, and

cultural uses that stretch along Kyu-Yamate Avenue

in Tokyo’s Daikanyama district. Since the design of

the first increment in 1967, the project continued to

grow for thirty years, progressing through seven

stages.37 Each stage of the development emerged

from the pattern set by previous designs but

distinguished itself by reflecting revisions of

planning regulations, developments of technology,changing consciousness of the architect, and the

shifting character of the urban context as

Daikanyama evolved from a quiet residential area

to a bustling commercial district. Hillside Terrace

thus constitutes ‘‘group form at its most dynamic,

growing and evolving organically over time.’’38 An

open system with a certain degree of ambiguity, the

ensemble responds to uncertainty and celebrates

the aesthetic of transformation. As the project

grows, group form is able to accommodate newadditions and changes, but each stage remains

complete in its own form. In Maki’s point of view,

such a cumulative townscape has become the

essential character of Tokyo and suggests a new

urbanity for the contemporary city.

Isozaki’s concept of ‘‘ruins,’’ a more radical

Metabolist response to Japanese culture and urban

context, referred to the state of a city after a

catastrophe. Isozaki did not become a formal

member of the Metabolist group, but he was aproponent of the Metabolist ideas and a frequent

collaborator of Tange and the Metabolists. Although

Isozaki shared the Metabolists’ enthusiasm for

megastructural form and futurist technology, he

disagreed with their optimistic views that the

development of a city is a continuous process and

that urban growth and transformation are more or

less predictable and thus can be planned,

structured, and controlled. On the contrary, Isozaki

contended that sudden catastrophic ruptures couldoccur in the development of urban society. He first

presented this idea of ruins in a photomontage

entitled ‘‘Incubation Process’’ in 1962, included in

an exhibition featuring the Metabolists

(Figure 18).39 The montage was characterized by

his 1960 Joint-Core System project, with the image

of this futuristic city superimposed on a picture of

classical ruins. Fragments of giant Doric orders were

14. Kiyonori Kikutake, Softitel Tokyo, completed 1994, demolished 2007 (Photo by author).




recycled and became the base of a cluster of megastructures anchored by a strip of urban

freeway.Through this montage, Isozaki argued that

metamorphosis would be both destructive and

constructive, and as a result, human society would

repeatedly cycle between city and ruins: ‘‘In the

incubation process, ruins are the future state of our

city, and the future city itself will be ruins.’’40

Representing an ironic and somewhat pessimistic

attitude toward the modern city, Isozaki’s concept

of city ⁄ ruins has proven to be prophetic. It isparticularly telling when we are confronted with the

possible destruction of Nakagin Capsule Tower and

other Metabolist buildings. Moreover, the recent

great earthquake, tsunami, and resulting nuclear

meltdown in Fukushima, Japan in March 2011, with

its severe impact on Tokyo’s infrastructure, indicated

how vulnerable the contemporary city is in the face

of natural or man-made disasters. Ruins stand as

the counter state of a city and continue to remind

us of the destructive forces existing within it.The three Metabolist paradigms—

megastructure, group form, and ruins—have

provoked substantial resonance as well as ample

criticism since they were conceptualized in the

1960s. A complete account of the influence of

these paradigms is outside of the scope of this

article. However, I would like to place each

paradigm in a wider context and summarize their

distinct impacts in the interest of situating theparticular legacy of the Nakagin Capsule Tower.

Kenzo Tange’s spectacular Tokyo Bay Plan

aroused a new wave of excitement of ‘‘Make no

small plans,’’ as much as Daniel Burnham’s Plan of

Chicago in 1909 and Le Corbusier’s Ville

Contemporaine in 1922. Radical concepts of

megastructure, such as plug-in, spatial city,

mobility, system and capsule, were widely circulated

among visionary architects, including Yona

Friedman, Moshe Safdie, Paul Rudolph, andArchigram members such as Peter Cook and

Ron Herron. Numerous speculative projects in

the 1960s showed that the Metabolists and

Western avant-garde architects influenced each

other. Most of these projects, however powerful

and provocative, remained fantasies. Hampered

by technical limitations, even the few built works,

such as Safdie’s Habitat ‘67 and Tange’s Yamanashi

Press and Broadcasting Center, turned out to be

rather clumsy and inflexible. They fell short of theirpromise to bring new ideas to the mass market and

failed to influence conventional architectural

practice.

Architectural critics and social activists reacted

to the authoritarian implications of megastructure.

In an article published in Architectural Design in

1964, Peter Smithson attacked Tange’s Tokyo Bay

Plan not only for its impracticality and the cost of

its rigid spatial organization and circulation

system—he claimed that the gigantic interlocking

loop highway system was redundant—but also for

the political implications of this hierarchical form.

He wrote: ‘‘Whatever may be explained, it is, aboveall, centralized, absolutist, authoritarian . . .

somehow it has crept in at all levels—into its basic

thinking, into its organization, and residually, into

its imagery—for only the natural sensitivity of its

designers has taken the hard edge off its

ruthlessness.’’41 This overwhelming sense of order

described by Smithson is one of the reasons that

megastructural plans, when attempts were made to

realize them, often caused social disturbance and

anxiety. In a case much like Paul Rudolph’s LowerManhattan Expressway, Tange’s 1966 plan for Yerba

Buena Gardens in San Francisco encountered strong

resistance by local resident associations and activists

and was eventually abandoned.42

It was not until the 1980s that such large-scale

megaprojects with less ambitious social agendas

and more flexible layouts were reintroduced in a

number of regions in the world. Many of them

emerged during Japan’s ‘‘Bubble Economy’’ in the

eighties and involved massive reclamations onTokyo Bay, such as Tokyo Teleport Town and

Yokohama Minato Mirai 21 (Figure 19).43

Metabolism’s model of urban process, compelling

imagery of large-scale urban interventions, and

strategies for enabling for growth at a massive scale

were evident in many of these projects.

Maki’s idea of group form, although it never

became a dominant model of design, has remained

profoundly influential in practice. Giving priority to

individual elements over the system and a sensoryorder over a material one, the concept of group

form found much in common with Dutch

Structuralism led by Aldo van Eyck, one of the

Team 10 members. Both Maki and van Eyck were

inspired by vernacular human settlements and tried

to transform their informal order into contemporary

urbanism by establishing a reciprocal relationship

between part and whole, small and large, and house

15. Kisho Kurokawa, New capsule proposed for Nakagin Capsule Tower, 2006 (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).

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and city.44 Van Eyck’s Amsterdam Orphanage and

Hermann Hertzberger’s Central Beheer are two

buildings emblematic of this reciprocal relationship

across scales as a defining tactic of a group form

design strategy. Maki’s theory also contributed to a

new contextual and situational attitude toward

architecture and city, which arose in Japan and the

West during the 1970s and crystallized in Colin

Rowe and Fred Koetter’s Collage City .45 Instead of

imposing a comprehensive framework to regulateurban expansion and transformation, group form

called for recognizing and respecting preexisting

urban texture and stressed a city’s inherent process

of natural renewal as a template for new design

interventions.

Finally, Isozaki’s concept of ruins provided a

polemical metaphor critical of the progressive

ambition and faith in technology that had by then

dominated the modernist approach to architecture.

Based on this idea, Isozaki’s late work like Tsukuba

Science City of 1983 tended to engage history in a

paradoxical manner and was shaped by a serene

melancholy of decay and death. The metaphoric

representation of ruins inspired iconoclastic

architects throughout the world. In particular,

Isozaki’s discourse played an important part in the

development of postmodernism in the 1970s and

1980s. Although these historical metaphors andreferences helped Isozaki and the postmodernists

break the predicament of postwar modernism, it

soon turned into a straightjacket itself, with a

narrow focus on the formal narrative of

architecture. Nevertheless, on the urban scale, the

idea of ruins continues to remind architects of the

ephemeral character of the contemporary city and

reinforces a contemporary understanding of the

city as a process or event rather than a collection

of artifacts. Current interest in the

‘‘dematerialized’’ as a response to the growing

influence of new electronic and digital technologies

seeks to melt the boundary between the real and

the virtual in much the same manner as Isozaki’s

1962 montage.46

Conclusion: the Legacy of the Nagakin

Capsule TowerFor the most part, Metabolist theory does not play

a prominent role in architectural discourse

nowadays. However, the dynamics engaged by the

Metabolist urban paradigms are still profoundly

influential in the transformation of contemporary

cities. Their impact is demonstrated in the urban

landscapes of many Asian cities like Tokyo and

Shanghai, which are shaped by the various agendas

16. Kisho Kurokawa, Phasing Plan of Nakagin Capsule Tower Renovation, 2006 (Photo courtesy of Kisho Kurokawa Architect & Associates).




of public agents, planners, architects, and local

residents and organizations, as well as the flow of capital and pressures of globalization. These cities

can hardly be identified as coherent entities. They

are often characterized by a juxtaposition of

different patterns of urban intervention such as

super-block projects, giant office towers,

labyrinthine traditional neighborhoods, shopping

streets, and ghettos of minorities or migrant

workers. The cities often appear chaotic, but such

chaos often embodies a sophisticated and dynamic

order as these immense urban complexescontinuously transform and regenerate—like an

organism.47 In this sense, ‘‘metabolism’’ remains a

provocative term to describe the current urban

condition, especially when its Japanese meaning

‘‘out with the old, in with the new’’ is considered.

The Nakagin Capsule Tower proves to be a prime

example of such dynamism, tensions, and options

facing Japanese cities.

To a great extent, the crisis of the Nakagin

Capsule Tower was created by these forces of urbanregeneration, which has previously led to the

demolition of Tange’s old Tokyo City Hall,

Kikutake’s Sofitel Tokyo, and Kurokawa’s Sony

Tower in Osaka. Economic globalization has

accelerated the pace of urban change in Asian

megacities, and repeated destruction and

construction has become part of the everyday

urban landscape, which to a certain extent

resembles Isozaki’s prophetic imagery of

metamorphosis between a city and ruins. Indeed,the immediate context of Nakagin Capsule Tower

has changed dramatically since it was built in 1972,

with many parcels updated in the last decade.

Under such development pressure, an innovative

approach to conservation has to be sought,

because neither the Western approach to

preservation with its desire for stasis nor the

typically Japanese solution of a complete relocation

is feasible. At this moment, the Tower remains,

having withstood the severe earthquake of March2011. Its development plans are on hold as a

consequence of the global recession, but its future

remains uncertain.

The Nakagin Capsule Tower represents a

significant historical moment in postwar

architecture. Its design embodies the Metabolists’

urban and social ideals: a city of mobility and

flexibility, and a system adapted to the needs of a

fast-paced, constantly changing society. The

building celebrates the idea of interchangeabilityand flexibility through the capsule, and its history

reflects the rise and fall of Metabolism’s

technological utopias and the transformation of

Japan’s urban culture since the early 1970s. The

Tower thus stands as a living fossil offering a

comprehensive lesson in the success and failure of

postwar avant-gardes. A flawed yet compelling

prototype, it was designed and built in response to

17. Fumihiko Maki, Hillside Terrace, Tokyo, 1967–1997 (Axonometric. Photo courtesy of Maki & Associates).

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the emergence of a modern megacity and the rapid

transformation of a technological society. It has

become a bridge connecting the urban visions of

the postwar avant-gardes to contemporary

architectural culture.However, the value of Nakagin Capsule

Tower goes beyond its historic role as an

alternative to the static paradigms of modernist

architecture and urbanism. The building, and the

Metabolist movement it represents, has affinities

to issues that shape our present and future. The

Metabolist urban paradigmns—Megastructure’s

technological optimism, the iterative flexibility of

group form, and Isozaki’s ephemeral

ruins—emphasized the necessity of cultivatingnew relationships between form, technology, and

urban life in a manner that moves across scale to

link architecture and urban design. These

Metabolist urbanisms represented a body of

powerful and original ideals that continue to

stimulate bold visions of the contemporary city.

Concepts such as ‘‘metabolic city,’’ ‘‘artificial

terrain,’’ ‘‘marine city,’’ ‘‘living cell,’’ ‘‘capsule,’’

and ‘‘group form’’ have been appropriated by

contemporary architects addressing the massiveurban transformations and the global climate

change of the twenty-first century.48 In this

sense, Metabolism invented a new sensibility for

contemporary architectural culture. Therefore, the

preservation of the Nakagin Capsule Tower is

about more than the rescue of a historic artifact

or an indulgence in utopian nostalgia. Rather, the

building is emblematic of a prophetic vision of

the contemporary city and its processes, and this

represents its most compelling legacy.

AcknowledgmentsThe author would like to thank the editors of the

JAE and the anonymous referees, who provided

valuable comments to improve this paper. Professor

Thordis Arrhenius also provided inputs to an earlier

version of this paper.

18. Arata Isozaki, Incubation Process, 1962. Photomontage (Photo courtesy of Arata Isozaki Atelier).




Notes

1. Yuki Solomon, ‘‘Kurokawa’s Capsule Tower to Be Razed,’’

Architectural Record 195, no. 6 (June 2007): 34.The report first

appeared on http://archrecord.construction.comon April 30, 2007.

2. The building withstood the recent earthquake on March 11, 2011.

However, there is always concern that the Tower would not survive a

stronger earthquake closer to Tokyo.

3. Details of the proposed design were not revealed.The project was

currently put on hold because of the lack of available financing after theworldwide economic recession in 2008.

4. Günter Nitschke, ‘‘Tokyo: ‘Olympic Planning’ versus ‘Dream

Planning’,’’ Architectural Design 34 (October 1964): 482–508; and ‘‘The

Metabolists of Japan,’’ Architectural Design 34 (October 1964): 509–24.

Reyner Banham, Megastructure: Urban Futures of the Recent Past (New

York: Harper & Row, 1976).

5. Banham, Megastructure, p. 9.

6. The RIBA named Archigram the Royal Gold Medalists in 2002. RIBA

president David Rock wrote about this decision: ‘‘Archigram is a

marvellously fitting choice for a Royal Gold Medal for the beginning of

the twenty-first century, with the message and mixture of enthusiasm,

optimism, debunking, imagination, harnessing awareness of the

boundary-breaking realities of the sciences and arts outside, or on theedge of, architecture. While part of history, Archigram’s messages can be

interpreted for the future.’’

7. The recent publications on the megastructural movements include:

Peter Lang and William Menking, eds., Superstudio: Life Without Objects

(Milan: Skira, 2003); Simon Sadler, Archigram: Architecture without

Architecture (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005); Larry Busbea,

Topologies: The Urban Utopia in France, 1960–1970 (Cambridge, MA:

MIT Press, 2007); Hadas Steiner, Beyond Archigram: The Structure of

Circulation (London: Routledge, 2008); and Zhongjie Lin, Kenzo Tange

and the Metabolist Movement: Urban Utopias of Modern Japan

(London: Routledge, 2010). A book comprising of interviews with the

Metabolists and edited by Rem Koolhaas and Hans Ulrich Obrist is

forthcoming. In 2008, an exhibition entitled ‘‘Megastructure Reloaded’’

was held in Berlin. Heather Woofter curated an exhibition called

‘‘Metabolic Cities’’ at the Kemper Museum of Washington University in

St. Louis in 2009, featuring the works of Archigram, Metabolism, and

the Situationalist International. Another exhibition on Metabolism will

open at Mori Museum in Tokyo in 2011.

8. Kiyonori Kikutake et al., Metabolism: The Proposals for New Urbanism (Tokyo: Bijutsu sh upansha, 1960).

9. Ibid., p. 3.

10. The National Capital Region Development Plan, published by

Tokyo Metropolitan Government in 1958, was inspired by Patrick

Abercrombie’s 1944 concept for London. It proposed creating a

green belt around Tokyo’s center city and a number of satellite

cities outside of the green belt to absorb Tokyo’s population growth

and industrial expansion. Tange counteracted this radiant plan with a

linear concept, envisioning a megastructural city extending from the

existing urban core across Tokyo Bay to reach Chiba prefecture on

the opposite side. For details see Zhongjie Lin, ‘‘Urban Structure for

the Expanding Metropolis: Kenzo Tange’s 1960 Plan for Tokyo,’’

Journal of Architectural & Planning Research 24, no. 2 (Summer2007): 109–24.

11. In Japan, the 1970 Osaka Expo was regarded as a swan song of

megastructural projects. Architectural historian Wilhelm Klauser

observed that Tange’s mega-roof for the main pavilion at Osaka Expo,

which had elicited praise of many critics for its dimensions and its

concept of uniting peoples of the world under one roof, was later

viewed by Japanese architects as strangely dated because ‘‘its form had

evidently been inspired by those very chemical plants, refineries, and

shipping lines whose significance was rapidly declining after 1973.’’

Wilhelm Klauser, ‘‘Introduction: Rules and Identities,’’ in Christopher

Knabe and Joerg Rainer Noennig, eds., Shaking the Foundation:

Japanese Architects in Dialogue (Munich: Prestel, 1999), p. 12. Also

see Zhongjie Lin, ‘‘From Osaka to Shanghai: Forty Years of

Transformation of the World Expositions,’’ Time+Architecture, no. 1

(2011): 18–23.

12. Banham, Megastructure, p. 7.

13. Ibid., pp. 47, 57.

14. Ibid., p. 45.15. Jin Hidaka, ‘‘Nakagin Capsule Tower Building’’ (Tokyo: International

Union of Architects 2011 Congress), Congress Circular, 2008.

16. In fact, a surprising number of professionals, including travel

agents, accountants, and architects, moved in after the building was

completed and used the capsules as their business spaces. Hiroshi

Watanabe, The Architecture of Tokyo (Stuttgart ⁄ London: Edition Axel

Menges, 2001), p. 148.

17. Noriaki Kurokawa, ‘‘Challenge to the Capsule: Nakagin Capsule

Tower Building,’’ Japan Architect 47 (October 1972): 17.

18. Ibid.

19. Charles Jencks, The Language of Post-Modern Architecture

(London: Academy Editions, 1977), p. 40.

20. Watanabe, Architecture of Tokyo.

21. Botand Bognar, ‘‘What Goes Up, Must Come Down,’’ Harvard

Design Magazine 3 (Fall 1997): 35.

22. Kurokawa died of heart failure on October 12, 2007.

23. Kisho Kurokawa, ‘‘Recent Situation about Nakagin Capsule Tower,’’

Kisho Kurokawa’s website, May 30, 2006, http://www.kisho.co.jp

(accessed August 9, 2009).

24. ‘‘Nakagin Tower WAN Poll Result,’’ World Architecture News,

September 23, 2005, http://www.worldarchitecturenews.com/index.

php?fuseaction=wanappln.projectview&upload_id=162


25. Ibid.26. Audio representation of the exhibition ‘‘Home Delivery: Fabricating

the Modern Dwelling,’’ Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, July

20–October 20, 2008.The Pompidou Center also announced its plan to

prepare an exhibition on Japanese Architecture, and a real capsule from

Nakagin building, should it be demolished, would be featured at the

exhibition. Furthermore, a circular has been distributed by the Twenty-

fourth World Congress of Architecture (UIA), to be held in Tokyo in 2011,

calling for ‘‘reconsideration of the Metabolism Model.’’ Hidaka, ‘‘Nakagin

Capsule Tower.’’

27. Nicolai Ouroussoff, ‘‘Future Vision Banished to the Past,’’ New York

Times (July 6, 2009).

28. Several recent historic accounts have demonstrated this trend:

Steiner, Beyond Archigram; Busbea, Topologies; Sadler, Archigram; Langand Menking, Superstudio; Max Risselada and Dirk van den Heuvel eds.,

Team 10, 1953–1981: In Search of Utopia of the Present (Rotterdam:

NAi Publishers, 2006); and Cherie Wendelken, ‘‘Putting Metabolism

Back in Place: The Making of a Radically Decontextualized Architecture

in Japan,’’ in Sarah Williams Goldhagen and Rejean Legault, eds.,

Anxious Modernism: Experimentation in Postwar Architectural Culture

(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2000), pp. 279–300.

29. DoCoMoMo Japan pleaded for the United Nations’ heritage arm to

protect Nakagin building, but it did not succeed. Hidaka, ‘‘Nakagin

Capsule Tower.’’

19. Kenge Tange, Fuji TV Headquarters, Tokyo Teleport, 1997 (Photo by author).

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30. The Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties began being

enforced in Japan in 1950. As of 2009, there are 862 National Treasures

in the arts and crafts category and 210 in the structures category. In

addition, there are 9,435 Important Cultural Properties in the arts and

crafts category and 2,205 in the structures category. Database of

National Cultural Properties, http://www.bunka.go.jp/bsys/index.asp


31. John Thackara, ‘‘In Tokyo They Shimmer, Chatter and Vanish,’’ The

Independent (London) (September 25, 1991): 12.32. Bognar, ‘‘What Goes Up,’’ p. 35.

33. Ise Shrine’s ritualistic and performative rebuilding is said to have

started in 685 C.E. The period of rebuilding was a little in flux in the

past. In early times, it was nineteen years, and due to turmoil in the

middle ages, there occurred a complete interruption of more than one

hundred years. Later, it was officially set at twenty years. It is believed

that the period of around twenty years is predicated on the life span of

building. Some also say it may be the time needed for passing down the

necessary carpentry techniques. The last rebuilding happened in 1993,

the sixty-first on record. Arata Isozaki, Japan-ness in Architecture

(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006), pp. 131, 323.

34. Noboru Kawazoe, ‘‘City of the Future,’’ Zodiac 9 (1961): 100.

35. Nyozekan Hasegawa, The Japanese Character , trans. John Bestor

(Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1965), pp. 101–02.

36. Fumihiko Maki, Investigations in Collective Form (St Louis:

Washington University, 1964). This book introduces three prototypes of

collective urban forms: compositional form (referring to the conventional

method of composition based on a two-dimensional plane),

megastructure, and the group form. Investigations in Collective Form is

remarkable for a few reasons, first and foremost of which is its status as

the first written work to define the concept of megastructure (Maki’s

definition is used by Reyner Banham in his book), but the emphasis of

Maki’s book is on the group form.

37. The Hillside Terrace includes Hillside Stage I, 1967–1969; Hillside

Stage II, 1971–1973; Hillside Stage III, 1975–1977; Hillside Stage IV,

1985 (by Motokura Makoto, who previously worked in Maki’s office);

Hillside Stage V, 1987; Hillside Stage VI, 1992; and the Royal Danish

Embassy that was built in 1979 on one of the parcels originally owned

by the Asakura family, also designed by Maki. In 1998, Maki designed

Hillside West for a site only a short distance from Hillside Terrace. It

continued the rhythm of development of the preceding series. For

details, see Jennifer Taylor, The Architecture of Fumihiko Maki: Space,

City, Order and Making (Basel: Birkhäuser, 2003), pp. 132–38.

38. Taylor, Maki, p. 26.

39. The notion of ‘‘ruins’’ was also presented in Isozaki’s short essay

written in 1962 entitled ‘‘The City Demolisher, Inc.,’’ taking the form of

a dialogue between ‘‘Arata’’ and ‘‘Shin.’’ The essay contrasted a passion

for city-design and a quasi-Dadaistic desire for city deconstruction.

Arata Isozaki, ‘‘The City Demolisher, Inc.,’’ Kukan he [Toward Space]

(Tokyo: Bijutsu Shuppansha, 1971), pp. 11–20.

40. Ibid.

41. Peter Smithson, ‘‘Reflections on Kenzo Tange’s Tokyo Bay Plan,’’

Architectural Design (October 1964): 479–80.

42. For a study of Kenzo Tange’s Yerba Buena project, see Kuang

Shi, Gary Hack, and Zhongjie Lin, Urban Design in the Global

Perspective (Beijing: China Architecture & Building Press, 2006), pp.

112–22.

43. The Metabolist architect Masato Otaka was the master planner of

Minato Misai 21. For a detailed discussion of current mega-projects in

the Tokyo Bay area, see Zhongjie Lin, ‘‘From Megastructure to

Megalopolis: Formation and Transformation of Mega-projects in Tokyo

Bay,’’ Journal of Urban Design 12 (February 2007): 73–92.

44. Van Eyck studied primitive dwelling forms in central Africa and

developed the theory of ‘‘configurative discipline,’’ suggesting that such

a reciprocal relationship between part and whole reinforces each of their

identities. Aldo van Eyck, ‘‘Steps toward a Configurative Discipline,’’

Forum 16, no. 3 (1962): 81–94.

45. Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter, Collage City (Cambridge, MA: MIT

Press, 1978).

46. Bognar observes that many recent designs are characterized by

‘‘lightness, surface, fragmentation, and dissolution,’’ as demonstrated in

concepts like Maki’s ‘‘cloud-like formations,’’ Toyo Ito’s ‘‘spaces of

flows,’’ and Shigeru Ban’s ‘‘paper architecture.’’ Bognar, ‘‘What Goes

Up,’’ p. 38.

47. Rem Koolhaas observed that in Tokyo, ‘‘chaos is not only well

documented and understood, but that it has already become an object

for consumption . . . There, where intelligence meets masochism, chaos

had rapidly become the dominant leitmotif of architecture and

urbanism.’’ Rem Koolhaas, ‘‘Urbanism after Innocence: Four Projects,’’

Assemblage 18 (August 1992): 94. In Maki’s view, the order of a city

could reside in the seemingly chaotic scenes; it was the task of planners

to reveal the order by providing a conceivable organization or, in Kevin

Lynch’s terminology, the imaginability of the city. Fumihiko Maki,

Movement Systems in the City (Cambridge: Graduate School of Design,

Harvard University, MA, 1965), p. 11.

48. One of such examples is the NOAH project for New Orleans after

Hurricane Katrina, featuring an eco-friendly megastructure floating on

the Mississippi River to accommodate 20,000 residential units and

supporting facilities. Yuka Yoneda, ‘‘NOAH: Mammoth Pyramid Megacity

for New Orleans,’’ August 19, 2009, http://inhabitat.com/noah-

mammoth-pyramidal-arcology-designed-for-new-orleans/ (accessed

June 4, 2011).


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