co+labo radović  school year ends with Masters and Graduation Thesis defence sessions   

School year 2018-19 has ended with successful defence of all co+labo research theses - Masters: Mikogami Mayuko, Kobayashi Daisuke, Magome Ayumu and Keitaro Onishi (on the photo above), and System Design Engineering Graduation theses: Iwata Amami, Kawamoto Jumpei, Matsubara Motomi, Nishibori Shinichi and Shigemura Hiroki. The list of their research themes reflects the diversity of research interests pursued within co+labo at this moments:
Mikogami: "The Potential of War-Related Sites for Conservation, Adaptive Reuse and Requalification in Kanazawa"
Kobayashi: Cinematic Methods of Capturing Urban Identity in Japanese Films (1948-2013) -A Case of Ginza, Tokyo"

Magome: "The Study of Food Stands in Public Spaces of Business Districts  - The Case Study Central Tokyo"

Onishi: "The Potential of Privately Owned Public Space for Public Interest in professional sports facilities in Japan"

Iwata: "Indoor-outdoor interaction in Japanese archery facilities  and its impact on the quality of training and experience"

Kawamoto: "The Sense of “Yama” and Evaluation of its Perception a case study of Atago, Shiba and Roppongi, Tokyo"

Matsubara: "The Integrated Analysis of Spatial Experience in Time Transition, a case of Reversible Destiny Lofts. Mitaka"

Nishibori: "Evaluation of Spatial Diversity of glass-façade stores - a case study of Kuhonbutsugawa Ryokudo, Jiyugaoka"

Shigemura: "Contemporary Small Residential Buildings with Additional Function in Tokyo: layout, sequences, perception".

In co+labo, diversity matters. One of the key aims of education in the laboratory is to help students discover their own architectural/urbanist selves, through investigation of the themes and ways they feel comfortable and excited with. This school year was very successful in that regards. Sincere co+labo congratulations to all who have successfully completed and defended their works. Special co+labo congratulations go to Magome Ayumu, whose Masters Thesis defence made him the second Double Degree Keio-Politecnico di Milano graduate.  Congratulazioni, Mago!
Image below: 
Daiskue Kobayashi's fascinating synthesis map of cinematic representations of urban character of Ginza (1948-2013)

co+labo radović         Vedrana Ikalović's Final PhD review and  public defence                          

2019 at co+labo started with an important event at the very top, PhD end of our research production. Vedrana Ikalović has completed her Doctoral Thesis From Personal space to to Intimate Space: A Socio-Spatial Study of Domestic Urban Environments. Her final presentation and public defence in front of an interdisciplinary panel consisting of Professors Davisi Boontharm (Meiji University), Okabe Akiko (University of Tokyo), Jorge Almazán and Darko Radović/supervisor (both Keio University) was held on 15 January 2019.  

A brief summary: In a metropolis, among the inevitable and constant presence of others, life is often described as solitary and alienated. Such paradoxes are among the main features of metropolises, which attract more and more individuals who dwell in complex urban conglomerations. How attached to these complexities can we become? To what extent is our attachment, and consequentially the lifestyles and habits, imposed by the characteristics and the affordances of the spaces we dwell? And is it possible to generate, through planning, urban spaces with spatial characteristics that afford interaction? This research investigated these questions through exploration of intimate spaces, which emerge from the relationship between the self and the city.
An integrated approach consisting of a sequence of methods from different fields of study explored the arising questions, in the context of contemporary Tokyo. The conceptual framework was defined and suitable methods customized for each segment of the project. Ethnographic and sociological methods were applied in the qualitative stage of investigation in order to define spatial and socio-cultural characteristics of the concept. Based on the outcomes of ethnographic study, two predominant meanings of intimate space in Tokyo downtown area were defined: the utilitarian and the decorative. The sociological study helped define another place (as the “fourth place”) - a place of rest and solitude where people do not necessarily interact with others - and the network of significant places which construe the dispersed home. In complex and widespread metropolitan areas, homelike activities are getting spatially dispersed across the city, out of the house, into a variety of leftover spaces which afford intimacy, privacy and comfort.

Intimate spaces, as meaningful spaces in metropolises and urban conglomerations, afford engagement with the environment through a broad range of activities. Their socio-spatial characteristics are used for the exploration of their possible integration into the existing planning documents. The key conceptual aspects of a sustainable city were compared to the existing multi-levelled Tokyo planning system. An integrated methodology that opens the potential for urban planning to make places imbued with meanings useful to practitioners and decision-makers was developed. As an example of its application, intimate spaces in Taito Ward were identified in the Geographic Information System (GIS) and inserted as an additional layer to the Land Use Plan. That was in recognition of both (1) an existing phenomenon which needs to be acknowledged and (2) the necessity for its strategic inclusion in spatial planning of a sustainable metropolis.

co+labo radović                        co+labo WISHES YOU A HAPPY NEW YEAR                                     

co+labo radović  co+labo approaches the end of the year with a regular bōnenkai - 忘年会

co+labo radović  a JIA Tokai Design Competition Award to co+labo's Jumpei Kawamoto             
co+labo's undergraduate student Kawamoto Jumpei has won the Jury Award at the Japanese Institute of Architects Tokay Architectural Design Competition（JIA東海支部設計競技) after a convincing presentation at the event in Nagoya. The Jury, which was chaired by Toshikatsu Ienari and Toshihito Sasaki, and included Yoichiro Kurono, Sadaharu Komai, Yoko Nunomura and Mavashi Morimoto has recognised a fine sensibility which has, inspired by careful reading of Marcel Proust's À la recherché du temps perdu, shaped the project of an elegant, elegiac family home. 

The warmest co+labo congratulations to Jumpei-san!