![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/678d147ee4eb8970315f5fda52672f1b92bf244e521b2b1a3ff61deaf907df1b/26.jpg)
ALTEKA OFFICE BUILDING
Location: Tokyo, Japan
Year: 1991
A
paradigmatic city of accumulation, juxtaposition, and compression, Tokyo is an
index of contingent, tentative relations and new, complex urban realties. Enfolded
within the evolving reality of a mediated age, every Tokyo site is a nexus of
activity that each building tries to stabilize and repress.
This project suggests another relationship to the city. Caught between the traditional city fabric and the Jigamae, a new large avenue, our folded tower suggests that an object is no longer defined by standard of maintaining the appearance, or imposing a law, of constancy, but by a situation in which the fluctuation of the norm replaces the permanence of law, with the object taking place in a continuum. Thus, the object no longer corresponds to a spatial mold but rather to a temporal modulation that implies a continual variation as much as a perpetual development of the form. The object becomes an event, opening up, unfolding. The building evades a purely Cartesian definition by not representing an essential form. Instead, it is a form “becoming.”
This project suggests another relationship to the city. Caught between the traditional city fabric and the Jigamae, a new large avenue, our folded tower suggests that an object is no longer defined by standard of maintaining the appearance, or imposing a law, of constancy, but by a situation in which the fluctuation of the norm replaces the permanence of law, with the object taking place in a continuum. Thus, the object no longer corresponds to a spatial mold but rather to a temporal modulation that implies a continual variation as much as a perpetual development of the form. The object becomes an event, opening up, unfolding. The building evades a purely Cartesian definition by not representing an essential form. Instead, it is a form “becoming.”
Concept
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/e963e6e28d06f468add54c76ada1e33bd2fdabbaa759d2614eeed496bdb1ac76/26_ALTEKA_CONCEPT1.jpg)
Drawings
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0f0d469ed5a0663ee9d565e99cce735de75fbf3ba3351888124e69d62fceb84e/26_ALTEKA_DRAWING1.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/099c83df2ac66e0b24ba8ad73c3597881e39f7745e3af1d8170744a05513edba/26_ALTEKA_DRAWING2.jpg)
Model photos
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/153cb8602e14e6de2e5d0124af3aa1dc5ab480182f0e7be11b8856f5c0a31e53/26_ALTEKA_MODEL4.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0d48885ff6be3355c5665f8667468262aae1556fa328fd5b1edd7ecc6cac129d/26_ALTEKA_MODEL1.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/b4b42ea875d1c267b6c7dd1119af47bd1ec94ee0a45c73877c4a5462a7b2aba4/26_ALTEKA_MODEL2.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ad104171607d7f0fa95853f7dc0be83fc2948b682361d200c218dac312a59f5d/26_ALTEKA_MODEL3.jpg)