Atelier Bow-Wow. A Primer

Tokyo-based Atelier Bow-Wow, founded by Yoshiharu Tsukamoto and Momoyo Kaijima in 1992, is counted among the most diverse architecture firms of today. The firm boasts over 40 residential houses, public buildings and numerous installations to its name, in addition to a substantial body of urban design studies and theoretical essays. 

Atelier Bow-Wow is part of a generation of architects that took the recession in early 1990s Japan as an opportunity to develop a new design practice in response to changed planning and social conditions. The firm’s first studies focused on anonymous Tokyo buildings and highlighted the ways in which they met the requirements of residents and visitors whilst also complying with infrastructure and planning regulations. As well as this Tsukamoto and Kaijima devised a particular type of residential building for Tokyo: a small-scale house that offered an ideal solution to the lack of living space in the densely populated megacity. Their most recent studies also investigate rural and traditional constructions in the context of their cultural and geographical environments.