KENGO KUMA substance
Domino 3.0
Location Venice, Italy Completion 2025
Collaborators Ejiri Structural Engineers
AI Professor Yutaka Matsuo (University of Tokyo)
STRUCTURE Professor Norihiro Ejiri (Japan Women’s University)
Typology Cultural, Exhibition
Photography Nils Koenning
the cloud
Location Kraków, Poland Completion 2021
Collaborators Faculty of Architecture and Fine Arts, Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University
Typology Cultural, Exhibition Photography Kamil Krajewski
Antoine Barelhe; Stefan Tuchila
Komorebi
Location Saint Victoire, France Completion 2017 Collaborators Ejiri Structural Engineers area 3,229 ft² (300 m²) Typology Cultural, Exhibition Photography Robin Oggiano; James Reeve
Kodama
Location Trento, Italy Completion 2018
Collaborators Jun Sato Structural Engineers
CoNSTRUCTION D3 Wood area 269 ft² (25 m²)
Typology Cultural, Exhibition Photography Satoshi Asakawa
Uro-co
Location Tokyo, Japan Completion 2019
Collaborators Haseko Corporation; University of Tokyo, Advanced Design Studies (Kengo Kuma Laboratory, Yusuke Obuchi Laboratory, Associate Professor Jun Sato) area 161 ft² (15 m²) Typology Exhibition
Photography Kengo Kuma Laboratory
Nangchang-Nangchang
Location Guangju, South Korea Completion 2013
CoNSTRUCTION Mr. Hwang In-jin ILLUMINATION Bitzro
Area 775 ft2 (72 m2) Typology Cultural, Exhibition
Photography Kengo Kuma & Associates
CASA BATLLÓ STAIRS
Location Barcelona, Spain Completion 2021
Collaborators Viabizzuno
area 2,799 ft² (260 m²) typology Cultural, Exhibition
Photography Imagen Subliminal
IRORI & PAPER COCOON
Location Milan, Italy Completion 2015
Collaborators Ejiri Structural Engineers; Kitchenhouse; Time & Style; TJM Design; Viabizzuno Area 700 ft2 (65 m2) Typology Cultural, Exhibition
Photography Takumi Ota
Kengo Kuma is an acclaimed Japanese architect whose work masterfully engages experimentation, traditional Japanese design, and twenty-first-century technology. This results in highly advanced yet beautifully simple, evocative, and human-scaled structures.
Kengo Kuma: Substance, the follow up to Kengo Kuma: Topography (2021), explores the work of Kengo Kuma & Associates through six materials—wood, bamboo, metal, paper, textile, and stone—and presents the ideas behind each work. The thirty-five projects, from around the world, range from captivating wood pavilions, ethereal metal installations, and sculptural woven structures to experiential stone monuments, intricate bamboo tea houses, and luminous shapeshifting domes.
By experimenting with substance—the substance of materials and ideas—Kengo Kuma seeks to restore the relationship between people, buildings, and nature, and foster a greater sense of humanity in architecture.