Keisuke Maeda of UID Architects has designed the Pit House in Tamano, Okayama, Japan. As you can easily notice from the pictures below, the dwelling embraces its site with the main living functions in a space that extends the exterior into the interior, dug into the ground in a sort of ‘pit.’ The architects from UID explain: “This time, we came up with a living form that accepts the outside environment such as surface of the terraced land, surrounding neighboring houses’ fences and walls, residences that sit along the slope and far beyond mountains. The architectural principle is not a division from the land with a wall, but an interior that is an extension of the outside and connection of the surface like a pit dwelling that is undivided from the land. In concrete, six types of floor levels including a round floor that is created by digging the surface are connected with a concrete cylinder core at the center. Furthermore, delicate and multiple branch-like columns that support the slightly floating boxes produce various one-room spaces.“
The site is located on a terraced mountain hill that was developed as a residential land. The family is consisted of a married couple and a child. The studio considered a new way of architecture on the site condition, where views are open towards the north and the ground level is one meter higher than the road level.
The architectural principle is not a division from the land with a wall, but an interior that is an extension of the outside and connection of the surface like a pit dwelling that is undivided from the land.
Many separate levels contain small gardens and several programmatic elements.
An inset glass wall wraps the interstitial space between land and building to let in natural light into the main volume of the residence and create a visual continuity to the outside.
