Rationalization and Manufacturing

We believe that the restoration work has been completed to be as close to the original as possible, by using the blueprints drawn up primarily by Condor and Sone Tatsuzo, construction documents from the time, measurements and photographs taken at the time of demolition, and remaining architectural materials. We look forward to hearing in "The Other World" what opinion Condor and Sone Tatsuzo, the founders of our firm, will give of the work.

This construction project relied heavily on the manual skills of the artisans involved in almost every step of the process, including brickwork, stonework, wooden trusswork, metalwork, wood carving, plastering, and natural slate roofing. In recent years, construction work has become increasingly mechanized, with components manufactured in quality-controlled factories and assembled on-site using heavy machinery. While this may seem extreme, the building was completed without any human hands touching any of the components. Comparing the total number of people involved in the construction of the Marunouchi Park Building and Mitsubishi Ichigokan, both completed simultaneously on the same site over a 27-month construction period, the former involved approximately 960,000 people and the latter approximately 50,000 people. The former has a total floor area of 205,000 ^m², while the latter is 6,000 ^m², meaning the total number of people per square meter of floor area is 4.7 for the former, which was built using cutting-edge technology, and 8.3 for the latter. These figures also demonstrate the extent to which manual labor on-site has been reduced due to streamlining through mechanization. According to the Kojien dictionary, rationalization is "the adoption of new technologies and restructuring of corporate structures in order to maximize labor productivity. In essence, it is a means of achieving excess profits." While aggressive rationalization has certainly increased productivity and economic efficiency on construction sites, it has also simplified architectural details, leading to the prevalence of simple, commonplace designs like all-glass windows. This trend has led to fewer opportunities for highly skilled craftsmanship, and the fact that the transmission of skills is on the verge of being discontinued has been ignored. Accustomed to playing around in computer-generated virtual reality spaces and surrounded by simulated building materials like stone and natural wood, we tend to forget the importance of the invisible aspects of construction, such as the process, structure, and materials used.

The restored Mitsubishi Ichigokan features expressive details with deeply carved details in the Queen Anne style of the British Victorian era, and each brick, stone, and natural slate was constructed by hand by artisans, exuding the enthusiasm and warmth of the craftsmen in every corner of the building. In addition, the 15m eaves height is roughly the same as the height of the ginkgo trees lining Babasaki Street, and the human-scale space adds vitality to the town. Seeing Mitsubishi Ichigokan emerging among the office buildings, I was reminded of the importance of utilizing the culture of handcraftsmanship that evokes the warmth of human hands, rather than just functionality and economy, in today's rationalized urban development.