(“Text as taken from the website”)
Ikko Kobayashi
Ikko Kobayashi was born in 1981 in Hyogo, Japan. In 2006, he graduated from Tokyo City University’s Department of Architecture (BA). He completed his post-graduation studies and graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts, Department of Architecture (MA) in 2009. In 2011, he established TERRAIN Architects. He started working as an adjunct professor at Tokyo City University in 2021.
Fumi Kashimura
Fumi Kashimura was born in 1983 in Kanagawa, Japan. In 2005, she graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts, Department of Architecture (BA). She pursued a master’s degree from Tokyo University of the Arts, Department of Architecture (MA), and graduated in 2007. In 2007, she worked at Yashima Architects and Associates and Boyd Cody Architects. She was a research associate at Tokyo University of the Arts from 2009 to 2011. In 2011, she established TERRAIN architects. She started working as an associate professor at the Tokyo University of the Arts in 2021.
Practice Ideology
Terrain Architects was established in 2011 in Tokyo and currently has two bases: one in Tokyo, Japan, and the other in Kampala, Uganda. They believe that architecture is a part of the “TERRAIN” it stands on. Beyond each site, a unity of architecture and place should also be a part of topography, culture, climate, people, and time.
Wherever it is, there are constraints or limitations to a building’s design and construction. The designers recognize that those ‘constraints’ are characteristics representing each place’s indigenousness, so they take them into account as positive elements of their design. In their design and construction process, they explore how architecture can utilize and maximize indigenous elements of each place.
