The former HQ of gaming giant Nintendo is getting a new lease of life as a boutique hotel, following a top-to-toe makeover by Tokyo hospitality group Plan Do See, in collaboration with architect Tadao Ando. Located on a low-key street between Kyoto's Kamo and Takase rivers, Marufukuro offers a new spin on the ancient city's long-standing balancing act between past and future.
The hotel spans three structures dating back to 1933. These housed the HQ and warehouse for the Kyoto-born Nintendo (whose distribution company at the time, Marufuku, specialized in playing cards), plus the residence of Nintendo's founders, the Yamauchi family. The buildings are a time capsule of early Showa-era architecture, riffing between Japanese and Western influences. Plan Do See's renovation weaves a contemporary edge into the unique interiors, which feature sweeping masonry, geometric motifs, art deco fireplaces and jewel-toned textiles. Meanwhile, Ando created a new annex in signature swathes of concrete, while advising on the renovation of the original structures.
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Guiding Light - Designer Joe Armitage follows his grandfather's footsteps in India, reissuing his elegant midcentury lamp and creating a new chandelier for Nilufar Gallery
For some of us, family inheritances I tend to be burdensome, taking up space, emotionally and physically, in both our minds and attics. For the London-based designer and architect Joe Armitage, however, a family heirloom has taken him somewhere lighter and brighter, across generations and continents, and into the path of Le Corbusier. This is the story of a lamp designed by Edward Armitage in India 72 years ago, which has today been expanded into a collection of lights by his grandson Joe.
POLE POSITION
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URBAN OASIS
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WARM FRONT
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BALCONY SCENE
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ENSEMBLE CAST
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Survival mode
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FLASK FORCE
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BLOOM SERVICE
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SECOND NATURE
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