A room is a decision about how you want to be tired at the end of the day.

I live in forty-eight square metres in Tokyo with one good chair and far too many bowls, so I have had to mean that. I trained as an architect and left to write, which my teachers took badly. Uchi (内) means inside, and it means home: the room you come back to. The palette comes after the tiredness. So does the name on the lamp.

This is where I keep what the world's rooms are doing. Around seventy sources, read in Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Italian, French and English: an apartment in Seoul, a house outside Taipei, a Copenhagen showroom seen from here rather than from Denmark. East first, because east is where I am sitting.

Each story is a headline, an excerpt of a few lines, one photograph and a link to whoever did the work. We never reprint the piece, and the photograph belongs to the person who took it. When a room was written up in Korean or Italian it stays in Korean or Italian here; the link takes you to the writer's own words.

I am not trying to be complete. I am trying to notice.

— Mio Tachibana, Tokyo

← Uchi Archive

Dezeen Architecture

Minimalist House in Japan by FORM/Kouichi Kimura is "reduced to the essentials"

10.29

A monochrome palette and pared-back, open interiors define the aptly named Minimalist House, a home in Japan designed by local studio FORM/Kouichi Kimura Architects .

Warm minimalism Japan-inspired

Read at Dezeen Architecture ↗

One letter a week, starting soon.

Latest

Minimalist House in Japan by FORM/Kouichi Kimura is "reduced to the essentials"

Related

ThailandART COLLABORATION KYOTO 2026 art4d

Where Cape Town’s working harbour meets Neri&Hu’s minimalist vision Hotel Designs

Behind the hose at Tokyo Fire Department’s elite Hyper Rescue 8 unit Monocle

Minimalismo orgánico: Este departamento de 90 m² elimina los muros para ganar luz AD Mexico

Au-dessus des toits de Paris, cet appartement de 120 m² transforme son décor minimaliste en écrin pour l'art africain AD France

Desalto x UNIQLO: Italian Design and Japanese Fashion in the Heart of Milan Archiproducts