Introducing Retro book café in a renovated traditional Nara townhouse — Café Franz Kafka, an example of Architect / Design office facility architecture in 302, Zeniya Honpo Main Building, 14-6 Ishigatsujichō, Tennōji-ku, Osaka by Yoshihiro Yamamoto Architects Associates.
A retro book café renovated from a Naramachi machiya (traditional townhouse).
Through the wooden lattice, sightlines extend from the interior to the small courtyard (tsuboniwa).
View from the entrance into the interior. A mimawari-saru talisman ('substitute monkey') hangs from the eaves.
A simple white box enclosing the kitchen provides coherence to an interior where Japanese and Western, old and new elements coexist.
A double-height void with a maximum ceiling height of 5.8 m created by removing the second-floor 'zushi' storage.
Turquoise mosaics and large-format Spanish tiles that converse with antiques from across time and place.
A bright engawa (veranda) and courtyard beyond the dim, narrow 'unagi-no-nedoko' (eel-bed) plan. The existing aluminum sash was removed and custom wooden folding doors were installed.
Shelf brackets are off-the-shelf steel fittings that have been heat-treated and given an antique finish.
View looking back into the interior.
Fabric that shimmers mysteriously depending on the angle of light.
Front elevation. Streetscape improvements were carried out using Nara City subsidies. The approach is finished with a pea-gravel exposed-aggregate wash.