Home and Furniture Design: Home Design : Japanese Traditional House

Traditional Japanese houses are made of wood and sustained by wooden poles. But nowdays the Japanese house usually has a western-style rooms with wood floors and often built with steel poles. Besides, more and more families in urban areas live in apartment buildings, a large steel reinforced concrete.

There are two major differences between traditional japanesse home with the western style house, the people do not wear shoes in the house and at least one room which tend to be designed in Japanese style, called tatami floors. People leave their shoes upon entering the house to keep floors clean. Genkan (玄关), which is the entrance, is a place to take off our shoes, put it down, and wear it again. After releasing the shoes, the Japanese people wearing house slippers.

So when enter the Genkan (玄関), we can see how the shape of the front view traditional Japanese house and modern home in big city, those in the city there may be no space for garden and parking area in front of the house but at few other cities such as the city of Higashi Hiroshima usually in front of the traditional Japanese houses there is a garden (niwa 庭) are quite extensive.

Some differences of interior design and exterior design between the traditional houses in Japan with homes in other country :

Front garden and home, genkan 玄关

Japanesse style gardens are usually located in the back and front of house area. Garden which features natural rock pool equipped 盆栽 bonsai, bamboo water fountains, and other bamboo crafts making traditional Japanese house more attractive.
Sometimes the front of the house or porch area of the Traditional Japanese style does not reflect a gate of the house, seemed not even look like a stately gate, usually it goes directly to the genkan (玄关) and toilet (トイレ).
The usual entrance in Japan there is only one. This is in contrast with other countries that view the front of the house looks magnificent and there are a lot of other country homes has an iron fence entrance, such as garage doors, main entrance, side entrance and rear entrance, etc..

Room (heya 部屋)

Japanese traditional house layout is designed for multiple functions. One room can serve as a living room and dining room during the day, and serves as a bedroom at night. Furniture that is usually not much for the cabinet together with the structure of the building called fusuma ふすま Japanese futon mattress storage (布団), and other clothing, so no need to buy a wardrobe. All corner rooms Japan will be utilized optimally. In Japan almost no room to sleep because they are accustomed to using a futon on the tatami 畳.

Yes, tatami is a kind of thick mats made of straw, has been used in Japanese homes since about 600 years ago. A piece of tatami usually measures 1.91 x 0.95 meters. Room size is usually based on the number of tatami. Tatami floor is cool in summer and warm in winter, and still more fresh than the carpet that can be damp in the winter months. This is due under the tatami there are air vents that are not directly under the house, but comes from a place that used to regulate air condition, where there are a variety of pipes such as water pipes, gas pipes, and drains etc.

Kitchen (daidokoro 台所).

Design of Modern Daidokoro

Japanese home kitchen design can be said to be very narrow when compared with the usual kitchen designed in other countries. Japanese kitchen ventilation always concerned to absorb smells awful while cooking. In some other places in the world, such as kitchen ventilation is usually not observed.
Japanese house design with a narrow kitchen space, always provide ventilation to air out, except in the apartment where the kitchen and bathrooms are in the same space.

Bathroom / Toilet
The most impressive buildings of the Japanese house is a beauty, cleanliness. Bathrooms are usually divided between a place to wash our face (senmenjo 洗面所), bathroom (ofuro お風呂), WC and urinal (トイレ). Japanese toilets are usually always dry and there is toilet paper, which is a very important for Japanese people. They do not use water while in the toilet. Toilet paper is used instead of water so that the toilet is always dry. But this time toliet equipped with advanced technology. Shower to wash it instead of manually rotated as usual but only with a button. Air for drying is also available. There was even a spray of perfume fragrances.