21KOMCEE,
THE TOKYO UNIVERSITY

“We want to create an introspective place that wins the affection of everyone on Komaba Campus.”—At The University of Tokyo, as many students, after spending their first two years at the Komaba Campus, spend the two years of the second half of their course at Hongo Campus, they think of their stay at Komaba in the first half as just a place they pass through along the way. Then, after graduating they never really feel much attachment to Komaba. So in 2010, I was asked by the teaching staff at the Komaba Campus if they could “Borrow the power of light.”

From my own experience as a graduate student, it came to me immediately what to do—“Let’s create an oasis!” At an oasis in the desert, people gather and exchange things, information and ideas, and from there, new things are disseminated. To realize such a place, I proposed series of original light object called “Koyu” (upwelling of light) that gave the image of ripple patterns in the 3-story-open-ceiling multi-purpose hall, a bouquet of special order pendant “Kiho” that was inspired from of water droplets in the atrium, and plates of sunshine filtering through foliage that evoke the feeling of resting under trees in the cafeteria. Right in the middle of the installation of these custom-made objects, the Great East Japan Earthquake hit. The complexly structured “Koyu” has proved its sturdy construction via this unexpected “anti-seismic check”. Through the use of a special lens, it was designed to gently project ripples of light on the ceiling. On top of it, indirect lighting adds expression by using various coloring that suitably matches the nature of each event supposed to be held in this hall. As the building is a CO2 zero-emission building, one of the challenges was to use only LED. The project also earned me a design award from IES, and I was also able to give something back to my old school.