Gallery MA Tour: Nosaku/Tsuneyama: Urban Fungus – Architecture is a Complex Mesh

Company Profile

Fuminori Nousaku and Mio Tsuneyama are Tokyo-based architects. They engage in critical architectural practice on the theme of contemporary cities and ecosystems.

Their representative works include Holes in the House (Tokyo,) House For Seven People*(Tokyo); Akeno Raised Floor** (Yamanashi Prefecture); Piles and Pointed Roof (Tokyo); Guest House in Takaoka*** (Toyama Prefecture); Himi Migrant Village (Toyama Prefecture); and ”House on Classical Elements” Smart Village in Akiya (Kanagawa Prefecture).

They received numerous awards including the 15th Venice Architecture Biennale Special Mention Award (for the Japanese Pavilion exhibition); the 33rd JIA Young Architect Award**; and the AIJ Selected Works Young Architect Award.***

* Mio Tsuneyama ** Fuminori Nousaku *** Fuminori Nousaku ＋Junpei Nousaku

All others works: Fuminori Nousaku ＋ Mio Tsuneyama

Mio Tsuneyama, Architect

Born in Kanagawa Prefecture in 1983. Worked at Bonhôte Zapata Architectes (Switzerland) from 2005 to 2006. Received the Swiss Federal Government Scholarship from 2006 to 2008. Graduated from the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in 2008. Worked at HHF Architects (Switzerland) from 2008 to 2012. Established mnm in 2012. Assistant Professor at Tokyo University of Science (TUS) from 2015 to 2020. Special lecturer at TUS from 2020 to 2021. Visiting Professor at EPFL from 2022 to 2023. Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia University in 2023.

Fuminori Nousaku, Architect

Born in Toyama Prefecture in 1982. Graduated from Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) in 2005 and completed the graduate program at Tokyo Tech in 2007. Worked at Njiric+ Arhitecti (Croatia) in 2008. He has been leading Fuminori Nousaku Architects since 2010. Obtained Ph.D. from Tokyo Tech in 2012. Assistant Professor at Tokyo Tech from 2012 to 2018. Associate Professor at Tokyo Denki University from 2018 to 2021. Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia University in 2023. Currently Associate Professor at Tokyo Metropolitan University.

Exhibition Description

Nousaku and Tsuneyama have been researching the relationship between architecture, cities, and ecosystems at universities in Japan and abroad while designing architecture and writing articles. They have been renovating the “Holes in the House,“ their home and office, from an ecological viewpoint by drilling holes in the slabs of the existing steel frame house to circulate light and heat, breaking the concrete-covered exterior with their hands, and improving the soil. It is a place of implementation where they experiment and develop what they learned elsewhere into upcoming projects. They attempt to bring the wild back into the city based on their idea of “Urban Wild Ecology” and actively incorporate traditional knowledge of stone masonry and wood framing as well as materials that return to the soil, such as straw and earthen walls.

They refer to cities as “human-influenced habitats for diverse organisms. “It decomposes part of contemporary cities faced with challenges, absorbs their nutrients, and grows like a fungus (mushroom.) They see architecture as a nexus point in the mesh of such decay and regeneration while striving to establish multispecies networks by using the wild and traditional knowledge to cut into the mesh and reconnect them.

This exhibition is an attempt to share their small trials and errors that everyone can emulate to reconnect the mesh through cross-sectional drawings and models of projects, including the proposed further renovation of the “Holes in the House” and the latest, “House on Classical Elements” Smart Village in Akiya. We hope viewers will perceive the possibilities and visions of architecture in the age of Anthropocene beyond it.