Discover Japan House
A Cultural Home in a Commercialised City
“A good Western door creaks open heavily; a good fusuma or shoji glides opens silently with the touch of a finger”
-Maki Fumiko
Only a few steps away from the tube station on the High Street in Kensington is the Japan House. Situated between a Hobbes, an H&M and diagonal to The Ivy Restaurant, the exterior of the Japan House projects outwardly the same visual prestige as its brothers and sisters on Kensington High Street, each competing to draw in passers-by. Japan House cannot be described as a shop, nor a boutique. Installation, hub, perhaps even nucleus are more suitable words to describe it, though it is self-described as ‘the cultural home of Japan in London.’
Through its windows, one can make out large white blocks, each of different sizes, some of which are hollowed from within a wall, others which are solid islands situated in random, and yet perfectly balanced proximity from one another. Balance is considered to be central to many of Japan’s cultural and spiritual practices, yet in this busy, and very wealthy, part of central London, balance is not something that might be typically associated with the area. The so-called work-life balance, which is never in check, as well as economic inequality, are both signified by an area of huge wealth such as this. However, whilst the Japan House is evidently a commercial enterprise, the exhibitions and learning resources found here are an example of when the commercial attempts to meet increasing cultural awareness and promoting social progress through the act of education.
The current ‘Windowology’ exhibition, situated right at the core of the building, draws our attention to a facility often unthought about, though always in use: windows. ‘An increase in the size of windows is indicative of an increase in civilization,’ a quotation from Antonin Raymond, is etched strikingly across the walls of the exhibition as part of the ‘Windows on Words’ section of the exhibition.’ ‘The cultural significance of windows’, is a sentence that upon first reading might seem satirical or self-important, yet, as the Windowolgy exhibition demonstrates, architecture and design shapes our lives in unconscious, yet extremely powerful ways. One such way is the connection between windows and craftsmanship.
Displayed on yet more solid white blocks in the middle of a room that was almost completely white, were a variety of materials that might be used in craft or design. One such material, ‘washi’ paper, is paper made in japan made of with pulp, water and chemicals, but that is often decorated before being left to dry. Washi paper has a brittle, yet smooth texture. As opposed to the luminous, beaming white paper found in most UK stationary shops, when one uses washi paper, one feels more connected to the hands that made the paper.
Whilst Japan House is a respite from London’s chaos, it is also an important reminder of the cultural richness of this city. This is what Japan House offers that other enterprises do not; a genuine feeling of proximity to a diverse culture, different to that which surrounds it on Kensington High Street.
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