In this book the phrase “small houses” refers to residential architecture for private clients that is outstanding in terms of space and design. Although there have been many publications concerned with Japanese minimal houses, this book approaches them on a more comprehensive level: it seeks to reveal the possibilities offered to contemporary architects by the architectural brief of a residence and to clarify, both in an introduction on the history of architecture and in various in-depth texts, the cultural and social principles that influence the architecture of individual residences in Japan.
