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Japanese Master Architect Tadeo Ando + Water

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Much has been written about the great Japanese architect Tadeo Ando. But I just noticed how very much his work seems to involve the inclusion of acceptance of the cold and wet experience of water.

He brings water into architecture as an aesthetic element, just like other architects use light and volume.

The central courtyards of Tadeo Ando houses have been situated so that inhabitants need to walk outside to walk between rooms of the house.

It can rain (or snow) within this central stairway connecting rooms under an open coutyard at the heart of the Azuma House.

The residents say they don’t mind carrying an umbrella or even actually getting wet.

In his Church on the Water in Hokkaido, Ando treats a nearby lake, and the forest rimming it, as part of the church interior.

Water is almost a “carpet” extending out from the floor. Shelter is not seen as protection from water.

Romantic and mysterious, the church is a popular wedding spot for young Japanese couples.

For his Water Temple, built far away in a small town in the isolated northern part of Awajishima Island, he incorporates a traditional circle shaped lotus pool.

But the water forms the roof of the temple, and to enter the temple, you descend “into” the lotus pool.

If water is used as a carpet in the Hokkaido Church on the Water, in the Water Temple water has become the roof.