Firm： KTX archiLAB

Type： Commercial › Office Educational › Other

STATUS： Built

YEAR： 2017

SIZE： 1000 sqft - 3000 sqft

Photographer: ©Stirling Elmendorf

White and Steel is a design for Toshin Satellite Preparatory School in Nagata Ward, Kobe City, Japan. The school wanted a new reception and office including meetings and consultation spaces. I

t is an undeniable fact that black and white produces the strongest contrast. Nevertheless, this new design for Toshin creates contrast not only in color but also in various aspects touching human senses.

All textures are uniformly painted white generating an inorganic and homogeneous space. To make the contrast, a base material of iron called “black skin iron” was applied to several surfaces. The oxide layers generated on the iron surface during rolling process results on an enchanting blueness and shows an organic expression similar to that found in the traditional Japanese Ink Wash Painting or other abstract paintings.

The entrance door gives to a large white hall like in contemporary art galleries. The backwall separating the reception counter and the backyard was covered in the Black Skin Iron plates and illuminated through surface lighting in the ceiling. To the right a glazed conference room perceptible from all over the place. A door on the left side of the counter leads to the study room. next to it two consultation tables decorated by nothing, but two metallic plates hanged on the white wall the way a painting would have been hanged. This piece of art, however, is created and offered to us by nature itself. The White uniform background further highlights the outline of this materiality and gives the iron an advantageously solid appearance.