Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa by Yang Tian

Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa by Yang Tian is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2025 A' Design Award Uʻamea in Mamanu Ata Fa'atusa Competition Category.

UʻameaAta Fa'atusa· 2025

Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa

by Yang Tian

A' Design Award Uʻamea Winner in Ata Fa'atusa Category

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Verified Award Winner

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View at A' Design Award Press Release Award Badge

Colors

The Design

About Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa

Ina ia toe iloa le Fa'aonaponei o Iapani ina ua mae'a le taua, na mafaufau ai Kisho Kurokawa, o le sui sili ona talavou o le vaega Metabolism, i fale fa'aonaponei e pei o sela taitasi. E fealua'i, fa'agaosia, tupu, ma pala i latou, ma fa'ailoa mai ai se sosaiete fou e le toe nonofo ai tagata i se avanoa tumau. O le Fa'afolasia o le Tala o Nakagin e fa'aogaina ai le nusipepa e fai ma auala e fa'amauina ma fa'alauteleina ai lenei mafaufau Metabolism, e ala i le fa'afolasia e fau ai se tala a le taulaga.

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award Uʻamea

O le A' Design Award Uʻamea na manumalo ai Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa, o se faamaoniga mamalu e tuuina atu i mamanu lelei e faataunuu ai manaʻoga faapolofesa ma pisinisi e faamoemoeina mai galuega ua mamanuina lelei. O ē manumalo i le Uʻamea e faaalia ai le tomai tele, le faapitoa maualuga, le malamalama o tagata poto ma le mafai fatufatuaʻi o ē na faia. E faamoemoeina Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa e avea ma mea ua matuā vivii, mataʻina ma pelepelea e aogā ma fou. O lenei mamanu na manumalo i le A' Design Award Uʻamea e tuufaatasia ai faiga sili o le pisinisi ma e iai uiga faatekonolosi mafai ua fesoʻotaʻi ma le poto ma le taleni. Ona o lona faatuatuaina, e tatau ai Unfolding A Nakagin Story Fa'ailoga Nusipepa ona faaaloalogia ma ua mamanuina e tuuina mai ai faaleleiga o le olaga e fesoasoani e faia ai e le lalolagi se nofoaga e sili atu ona lelei.

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties: To re-identify Japan’s Modernity after the war, Kisho Kurokawa, the youngest Metabolism group member, imagines modern housing as individual cells. They move, digest, grow, and decay, informing a new society where people no longer live in a fixed space. Unfolding a Nakagin Story uses the newspaper as a medium to document and expand this Metabolism imagination, through “unfolding” to fabricate an urban story.
Dimensions & Packaging: Cover: 8" X 12"

Newspaper: 16" x 24"
Tags: Nakagin, Metabolism, Heritage, Housing, Urbanism
Production Technology: Graphics are done in Photoshop and Illustrator, the architecture is modeled in Rhino with a grasshopper plugin to change patterns and orientation.
Design Challenge: How can we capture the concept of Metabolism, where buildings can grow and shrink over time? How should I identify individual differences while the building comprises the same rectangular blocks? These are the two biggest challenges I need to solve. By using newspaper as the medium, one can feel the growth through unfolding the paper. One can also read individual stories despite repeating units by showing the interior information of selected blocks.
Research: Focusing on post-war Japanese architecture, Metabolism was the most influential architectural movement from the late 1950s to the early 1970s. Kisha Kurokawa changed the Western design ideology of FORM (ETERNAL) based living style to TIME (CHANGING) based living space. The Nakagin Capsule Tower is an iconic architecture that not only embraces ephemeral but also changes a collective to an individual-oriented living style.
Inspiration: To embrace the idea of flexibility and updating, the newspaper is a great medium as a representation tool. Newspaper changes every day with new information and unfolding it to gain new information reinforces the idea of metabolism. By unfolding the project, each time, the capsule patterns, window colors, shapes, and orientation change within an oblique neutral grid.
Project Duration: Duration: 3 months

Location: Boston, MA, USA
Operation Flow: You could unfold it three times, each time, the capsule patterns, window colors, shapes, and orientation change within an oblique neutral grid, and 7 capsules have been highlighted to expose the interior activities of an individual with personal information next to it. Individual yet connected, neutral yet different for each capsule. You will experience the beauty of the Nakagin capsule tower after you unfold its stories!