This small house with a triangular floor plan sits on a narrow sliver of lot wedged between a road and a river channel in west Tokyo. Designing the house for a couple and their young daughter, Mizioshi Architect Atelier maximized the interior space by pushing the walls and roof to the limits of the permitted building envelope.
Still, the house has only 55.2 m2 (595 ft2) of floor space over two floors, plus a mezzanine loft. The interior appears larger than that though, thanks to sightlines that extend the length of the house and spaces that borrow from adjacent spaces.

The steel-clad upper floor of the two-storey House in Horinouchi cantilevers forward to create a small sheltered car parking space below.

This upper floor houses a bedroom, a kitchen/dining room and a living room, where two projecting windows integrate a narrow desk and a balcony.

A ladder leads up from this floor to a mezzanine loft.

A master bedroom and bathroom are located on the ground floor.

We’ve published a few popular stories about residences in Japan in recent weeks, including

Photography is by Hiroshi Tanigawa.

River side house / House in Horinouchi
This is a very small house built on the triangle site where the river and the road were crossed and made to the acute angle.

For the dead-end road, it became a plan in various regulations for obtaining special permission.

Residents are husband and wife and a little girl.

Although it was a novel site of a limited area, since a river was faced through a bank and a promenade, I would like to design various relations with the river.

The building is the form that cut an acute angle part on a triangle plan derived from the site. Furthermore,it got the maximum volume of hip roof of three planes in restriction of setback-line.

Although the level 0 floor was a private space, it limits for dividing with the curtain of a race in the door, stairs, storage, etc. except for a bathroom. It enabled it to feel a spread.

The level+1 floor is devided into small areas by structural narrow walls, being connected with one by the ridgeline of a roof. So there are different open feelings and the relations with the river each.

That is
1. dining&kitchen / The west side space up the stairs is the largest planarly, and has high ceiling with a feeling of rise towards the roof top.

2. living / The central space is low ceilinged,and has full-opening windows on both sides as a balcony and the bay window that spreads outward with a feeling of floating

3. spare room / The east side space in the deepest is a form which is narrowed down to the direction of flow of the river, and is a space watching the light to insert earlier of the abyss.

4. loft / The space with two skylights is a space looking down at the river and looking up at the sky.

The limited volume snuggles up to the river, and I think that I was able to make various space that can live while looking for a favorite place to stay.

Project info:
Location: suginami,tokyo,japan

The reverse floor plan puts the main living space high enough to have a view over the raised walkway alongside the river channel.
The upper floor child’s bedroom is barely big enough for a bed but it does have access to the large mezzanine loft that could be used for sleeping.
Would you live in such a sweet home?