2004 Interior Architecture
The Japanese Room

The word Ma has several meanings: space, interval, room, pause, gap, time, or opening. The most essential meaning of Ma in architecture is that it is an interval of time and space. When talking about space from a Japanese perspective, time is an integral part of the experience of space.

Ma is the combination and integration of space and time. This points out a fundamental difference in the mindset of European tradition to read and construct space and that of Japan. The main reason being that in the Western world we use the coordinate system to describe space. We also use the tool of perspective to represent space. Neither of these ways of describing and visualizing space has existed historically in the Japanese architectural tradition, which has resulted in a very different type of architecture and the way it has been organized.

For cultures in the West, they perceive space and time united by an eternal pulsating circular movement. The ones in the East still see a joint forum of space and time, and this relationship is still very much alive. In Japan, this interdependence between space and time can be in an illustrative manner described through the Noh Theater. Noh is an art of time and space, and can therefore sometimes be called the art of Ma—the interval between two events, rhythm and dance, music, theater, and also the engagement of the audience.

Overview of Final Itinerary

Throughout the journey we stayed at various hotels and guesthouses in order to experience the different rooms with daily excursions to study old and new, classic and modern Japanese architecture during the peak cherry blossom season in April 2008.

We started the trip in Tokyo with our first accommodation at the modernist classic, the Okura Hotel. Designed in 1962 by celebrated architect Yoshiro Taniguchi, educated at the Harvard Graduate School of Design in the early years of Walter Gropius, the hotel is a glimpse into early 1960s Japan, midcentury modernism with traditional Japanese aesthetic. It is located close to business and government offices and next door to the Embassy district. The place is frequently visited by state officials, ambassadors, and government officials from many nations.

After a few days in Tokyo, we traveled to Kyoto, the former capital and historic city that captures precious evidence of the changes and developments in architecture. We stayed in a ryokan, the traditional Japanese guesthouse where building and landscape are melded in harmonic unity. They are one of the most authoritative exponents of traditional Japanese architecture in Kyoto. We dined at Kitcho, with a unique ten-course meal in this Japanese country home entertained by Geishas with a tea ceremony.

In our disappointment, we were not able to get an appointment at Kyoto Villa Katsura that holds the essence of traditional Japanese architecture and the principles of Ma. Instead, we did an architectural tour of the Imperial Palace of Kyoto. The palace complex exemplifies traditional Japanese architecture.

Returning back to Tokyo, we accommodated ourselves at the Mitsui Garden Hotel located in Ginza, one of Tokyo’s most modern and fashionable neighborhoods. Piero Lissoni, an Italian architect, designed the hotel and showcases Italian modernism but still with Japanese practice and experience. We set out to visit more touristic sites such as the Treasury Museum by Tegoushi, the son of the architect that designed the Okura Hotel.