Monospinal, the HQ of a successful Japanese gaming company was born as a symbolic manifestation of its users’ world and values, conceived by Tokyo-based studio Makoto Yamaguchi Design to house the firm’s core creative hub in the Japanese capital’s Taito-ku ward.
The building’s distinctive vertical sawtooth outline, which gives it its striking spine-like appearance, makes a bold visual statement that sits well with Japan’s renowned animation aesthetics, but it gives little away about its internal goings-on. It was Yamaguchi’s blend of conceptual and practical architectural thinking that led to this final form. ‘The diagonal walls are designed to deflect noise from the elevated train tracks nearby and to softly invite light and wind into the building,’ he says. ‘That, and the fact that each layer is separated by a horizontal line, though each layer appears to overlap, guided the design development.’
