Tane Garden House
A new project has be unveiled on the Vitra Campus during the week of Art Basel 2023 – a garden house by Paris-based Japanese architect Tsuyoshi Tane.
It has been almost three years ago that Rolf Fehlbaum, Chairman Emeritus of Vitra, took architect Tsuyoshi Tane for a drive around Weil am Rhein, talking about his childhood and his memories of the fields on which the Vitra Campus can be found today. It was at this moment that the idea for a new structure was born: adhering to Tane’s concept of ‘Archaeology of the Future’, which believes that architecture begins from the memory of the place where it stands, the Tane Garden House has been completed in June 2023 and inaugurated during the week of Art Basel.
‘Like archaeologists, we begin a long process of exploration and digging up the memory of a place. It is a process of surprise and discovery, a quest to encounter things we did not know, what we had forgotten, what has been lost through modernization and globalization. I believe that a place will always have memories deeply embedded in the ground and in history. And that this memory does not belong to the past, but is the driving force that creates architecture. Through this process of thinking about the future from the memory of a place, archaeology gradually becomes architecture,’ explains Tsuyoshi Tane.
Tane describes his architecture throughout his manifesto “Archaeology of the Future”. This design process is implemented in all the Atelier’s projects: the Estonian National Museum (as DGT.), Hirosaki Museum of Contemporary Art, The Al Thani Collection Museum space at Paris Hôtel de la Marine or most lately, the design commission for the Imperial Hotel Tokyo new building (to be completed in 2036).
The Tane Garden House measures 15 square meters, making it very compact and capable of accommodating around 8 people. It is primarily used for storing gardening tools. It is also available for use by Vitra employees who tend to the campus bees and are involved in the vegetable garden being created next to the Garden House. Outdoor seating and a small fountain are provided for watering, cleaning boots, and tools. Additionally, this building, located in the center of the campus, will feature a viewing platform from which visitors can enjoy unobstructed 360-degree views of the garden and the Vitra Campus.
Following this ideology, the Tane Garden House has been built upon the concept of “Above Ground”. By burning underground resources, traditional architecture plays a part in climate change. Tane Garden House, by using above-ground material such as stone, wood, thatch and rope is by essence, standing by nature’s side. On top of the materials selection, the construction itself is managed by local craftsmen using local supplies. The stone and wood used in the house were, for example, procured locally and only transported a short distance: 28 km for the granite stone (from the quarry to the stonemason and finally to the Vitra Campus) and 50 km for the wood (from the black forest to the factory and ultimately to the campus). Tane did not only limit the implementation of his concept to the construction phase of the Garden House, but integrated it as well into the maintenance to protect its sustainability. Tane is convinced that only local neighbourhood can support and protect longevity of architecture.
Measuring 15 m², Tane’s Garden House is very compact and can accommodate around 8 people. Equipped with a small coffee corner, it offers sufficient space for workshops, but is primarily designed to store the gardening tools utilized by the crew in the Oudolf Garden. It is also for use by the Vitra employees who tend to the campus bees and for those who participate in the vegetable garden currently being created next to the Garden House. Outside seating and a small fountain for watering or cleaning boots and utensils are also part of the construction. In addition, the building located in the middle of Campus, will have a viewing platform from which visitors can enjoy 360-degree unobstructed perspectives of the Oudolf Garten, the Umbrella House and the rest of the Vitra Campus.
Tsuyoshi Tane’s addition to the campus is the fourth by an architect of Japanese descent, after the Umbrella House by Kazuo Shinohara, the Conference Pavilion by Tadao Ando and the Factory Building by SANAA. Since November 18 2023, a special exhibition at the Vitra Design Museum Gallery is presenting insights into Tsuyoshi Tane’s work and his Garden House project.
