Warm Transparency Clinic by Yoshiaki Tanaka is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2020 Golden A' Design Award in Architecture, Building and Structure Design Competition Category.
GoldArchitecture· 2020
Warm Transparency Clinic
Client: TSC Architects
Golden A' Design Award Winner in Architecture Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #88206The Design
About Warm Transparency Clinic
Conventionally, a hospital tends to be a space that has poor natural color or material due to artificial structure material to improve the functionally and the efficiency. Therefore, patients feel that they are being apart from their daily life. A consideration for a comfortable environment where patients can spend and free from stress, should be taken. TSC architects provide an open, comfortable space by setting an L-shaped open ceiling space and the large eaves by using a plenty of wood material. The warm transparency of this architecture connects people and medical services.
The Recognition
About the Golden A' Design Award
Warm Transparency Clinic is a Golden A' Design Award winner, an immensely prestigious recognition granted to first-rate, marvelous, and outstanding designs. Golden winners are exceedingly innovative, visionary, and glamorously dazzling creations that reflect the prodigy, wisdom, and prowess of their designers. Warm Transparency Clinic is expected to be a highly praised, trendsetting, and monumental invention that delivers unprecedented value. This Golden A' Design Award-winning design is a spectacular, respected project that highly benefits and advances the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Warm Transparency Clinic creates intense feelings of desire, evokes passion, encourages creativity, and fascinates us.
Where to Get It
Healthcare and Residential Architecture Services
We specialize in creating warm, human-centered architectural spaces for healthcare facilities and residences. Our award-winning approach integrates natural materials, particularly wood, with transparent design principles to reduce stress and enhance wellbeing. From clinics to homes, we craft meaningful buildings that connect people with their environment through thoughtful Japanese design sensibilities.
Discuss Your ProjectInterviews
Grand Interview
Your innovative use of wood materials in Warm Transparency Clinic challenges traditional clinical environments - could you elaborate on how this design choice helps bridge the gap between medical spaces and patients' daily lives?
The architecture that is generally associated with new building materials tends to be a space lacking in natural colors and materials. In particular, the architecture of medical clinics has been covered with artificial materials in order to prioritize function and efficiency. It is becoming more and more distant from the ordinary senses of human beings.That's why we made extensive use of wood, a material that has long been familiar in Japanese homes, so that patients could feel relaxed and comfortable thanks to the warmth of the wood.
The L-shaped open ceiling space in Warm Transparency Clinic creates a unique connection between rehabilitation and waiting areas - what inspired this architectural decision to enhance patient experience and comfort?
By planning an L-shaped atrium, patients can spend time in a bright and open space filled with natural light. The L-shaped atrium not only connects the first and second floors, but also visually connects the clinic with the city.
How does the integration of large wooden eaves in Warm Transparency Clinic, extending from the interior to the exterior, contribute to creating a sense of security and welcome for patients before they even enter the building?
The large wooden eaves serve as a weatherproof approach space for patients and create a protected space like a veranda even when they are outside and become a place for the local community. In addition, the large eaves are designed as a passive design to shield the southeast side from the sun.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- The large wood eaves provide a space to receive the patients into the clinic and a veranda where the patients can feel the sense of secure even outside of the building. Inside the clinic, TSC architects provided a waiting space where the patients can feel the warmth of sunny and an open feeling by setting the L-shaped open ceiling space along the tangent. A plenty of wood material was used for portions touched by people directly for reducing nervousness. This building has "Warm transparency" for the town.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- Areas: Site dimension 711 sqm / Plot ratio 53% / built area 374 sqm / Total floor space: 501 sqm
- Tags
- Architecture, Hospital, Design, Life, Health, Public, Clinic, Warm, Transparency, Wood
- Production Technology
- Details of support structure: steel frame.
To configure the large eaves and the L-shaped open ceiling space, TSC architects adopted a steel structure with a brace. A space truss on the upper part of the open ceiling space plays an important role. Although a steel Y-shaped column, which consists of the space truss, are interposed between the wood material, the steel members are intentionally visible to show the functional means of the steel member. - Design Challenge
- A space truss on the upper part of the open ceiling space plays an important role to configure the large eaves and the L-shaped open ceiling space. To hide a horizontal member of the open ceiling space, the space truss is consisted of members of a half-size H-shaped steel and a flat bar. The surface rigidities of the space truss and the roof support the large eaves while securing a power transmission in the horizontal direction.
- Research
- A hospital tends to be a space that has poor natural color or material due to artificial structure material to improve the functionally and the efficiency. Therefore, patients feel that they are being apart from their daily life. A consideration for a comfortable environment where patients can spend and free from stress, should be taken.
TSC architects provide an open, comfortable space by setting an L-shaped open ceiling space and the large eaves by using a plenty of wood material. - Inspiration
- The client requested a clinic where we can feel warmth of wood. TSC architects tried to achieve a clinic that has "Warm transparency" by using a plenty of wood material for both the interior and exterior material. And TSC architects set the large wood eaves extended from inside of the building to a tangent between the town that has traffic laden street. The large wood receive the patients and generates a space where the patients can feel the sense of secure even outside the building, being a symbol of the town.
- Project Duration
- Project duration did from May 2018 to January 2019.
Location is 4-72 Kinjocho Kita-ku, Nagoya City, Aichi Prefecture. - Operation Flow
- The large eaves and the L-shaped open ceiling space generate a gradation for the boundary between gradation town and the clinic. They created a comfortable intermediate space in addition to a function as a building space. The L-shaped open ceiling space connects a spaces of the rehabilitation room and the waiting room on the second floor in addition to the outside and the inside of use clinic so that the patients can spend relax, comfortable time as if they are being in a lobby.
- Patents
- Yoshiaki Tanaka
- Image Credits
- Image #1: Photographer Hiroshi Tanigawa
Image #2: Photographer Hiroshi Tanigawa
Image #3: Photographer Hiroshi Tanigawa
Image #4: Photographer Hiroshi Tanigawa
Image #5: Photographer Hiroshi Tanigawa
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