Machi, Machinami, Machiya : a context for people's places in Japan

Abstract

This thesis attempts to present the structure of Japanese towns as the connection between physical amenity and use, and the meaning of spatial structure as it is formed and textured by the people who inhabit it. This is organized into four sections, the first, a discussion of Japanese culture and worldview as it relates to a sense of space. This section develops a framework and conceptual model for the later parts: a presentation of six towns in different parts of Japan; an analysis of these places as town, house, and street as they rela·te to this conceptual/ cultural model; and, the development of a language of form and structure of one of these towns through a series of design explorations.