Over the last three and half years, I’ve worked on translating a book 日本の都市空間 (Nihon no Toshi Kukan, meaning urban spaces in Japan) by 都市デザイン研究体 [Urban Design Research Collective] of the University of Tokyo, supervised by Kenzo Tange, published by Shokokusha originally in 1968. The process of studying the book and translating it into English has been a delight and a struggle; it unveiled my ignorance of Japanese history and lack of experience in translating texts with historically, culturally and architecturally specific terminologies, many of which couldn’t be identified by a simple google search – there has been so much time spent on exploring the National Diet Library website, and any historical resources available online. At the same time, it offered me numerous occasions to be proud of being Japanese and be grateful to be able to comprehend the concept of urban spaces as symbolic spaces the book presents through my personal experiences. The essay below is a synthesis of thoughts, reflecting on the way each article in the book supports the proposed idea of urban space as a distribution and density of symbols. I’m currently creating a website for translated texts, hoping to make it available to the public for research/educational purposes later in the year.

23/4/2024 Update: the website is done! Have a read of the book in English here: https://www.saran-kim.com/nihon-no-toshi-kukan

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Reflective Essay

Understanding urban spaces involves finding an intersection between theoretical perspectives on the formation of urban planning and urban design, human scale, sensory observations and the analysis of cities one inhabits. Framing urban space as a distribution of the density of symbols like intangible mist or atmosphere (p.25), the book Nihon no Toshi Kukan highlights the relationship between activity patterns, built fabric and intangible elements of spaces, informed by cultural, historical, social and environmental underpinnings. The book points out that the process of designing urban spaces involves the shaping of spatial compositions and order through the placement of symbols based on an intended imaginary structure. Although this imaginary structure often responds to specific landscape features and occurrences of the time, the book acknowledges the temporality and ever-changing nature of the urban space. Furthermore, the observation of urban spaces, particularly articulated by a series of case studies, offers a way of seeing urban spaces as a network of elements influencing each other and eliciting specific spatial experiences.

The book situates urban spaces in Japan in the lineage of historical urban design principles as spaces of numerous visualised symbols; emerging from elements within the spaces, their effects on spaces, and circumstances culminated by activities, these symbols, with systems to substantialise them, become the mediators bridging between the abstract urban design framework and the materialisation of urban spaces. In comparison to other generations of urban design, such as the substantialist stage that considered urban spaces as the design of physical shapes of elements, the functionalist stage that constituted a city as a diagram of discrete functions often without any references to reality, and the structuralist stage that imagined a city based on a physical spatial structure with an analogy of organism, the discourse on symbolic space questions the concept of urban design as a mere manipulation of physical entities in space. The book explores the relevance of urban spaces as distributions of symbols to Japanese urban spaces by dissecting the philosophical principles in Japanese culture, what it calls the “principle of space order” (p.29). Concepts in two categories – those forming the spatial structure and those reflective of spatial qualities and characteristics – highlight the spatial frameworks that infuse symbolic meanings into spaces. For example, the concept of the esthetic triangle, the dynamic balance created by an intentional asymmetry of elements, describes the multiplication of the mass (or density) and vectors (directionality) of elements as a way to ensure spatial equilibrium, suggesting the ability to adapt, grow and embrace impermanence over time while maintaining spatial tension. Moreover, these concepts illuminate the intangible nature of urban spaces, which emerge not from the existence of objects but rather from their absence. The idea of “ma” (imaginary space) is the negative space or understanding of space and time symbolised or defined by tangible elements. The book argues that adding physical ‘affectors’ that indicate functions of space further helps comprehend the meanings behind space. In other words, they are the images of symbols; those physical entities are never the essence of space themselves. By articulating the underpinning principles of urban spaces in Japan, this book not only points out the distinctive nature of urban design in Japan but also asserts that the symbolist approach to urban design can demystify the roles of tangible entities and unveil the intricacy and nuances of urban spaces.

Through focusing on the “Method of space composition” (chapter III) and “Affector in urban space” (chapter IV), the book claims that one’s understanding of urban spaces is continuously influenced and shifted by a sequence of spatial experiences and relationships between elements’ intrinsic characteristics and circumstances in which they contribute to spatial experiences. Subdividing ‘functions of elements’ into spatial materialisation and those of the given impression clarifies the difference between how elements relate to space and how elements engage with humans and leave a stronger impression on them as symbols than other elements. The former is exemplified by the analogy of a theatre consisting of a stage, performance, and effects. The stage is a space defined by platforms, structures, and various props that only emerge when the characters’ performance depicts the activities and effects of snow, wind, light, and sounds, bringing atmosphere and identity to the space. This analogy also supports the authors’ point that urban spaces are inherently the experience of fleeting moments, temporal in nature, realised by synthesising tangible and intangible symbols on both superficial and spatial levels. The latter is the acknowledgement of the subjective perception of people who subconsciously seek a spatial order and definition in the spaces they are in. The authors articulate that one’s way of seeing a space is relative to the relationship between elements, and urban spaces are accumulations of individuals’ perceptions and their city-shaping intentions. The fact that parts of urban spaces are built, demolished, altered, reshaped, and protected by humans over a long period based on subjective perceptions suggests the coexistence of a multitude of images in urban spaces. Both aspects of functions of elements, along with the methods of spatial composition, reinforce the ability of symbolic spaces to capture both the physical and conceptual sides of urban design; in other words, symbolic spaces effectively recognise the role humans play in experiencing and understanding urban spaces through all the senses and passage of time. The book demonstrates the ability of symbolic spaces to be deconstructed into a particular effect of a symbolic element in a specific moment and, simultaneously, to be considered as a sum of the whole, an ever-changing distribution of symbols at a macro scale.

In response to the challenges of materialising theoretical ideologies in actual urban spaces the previous stages of urban design encountered, the book demonstrates how the principles of space order and relevant methods of spatial composition are embedded in actual cities. While acknowledging the history of fixed lattice-grid cities such as Heiankyo, the authors argue that rigid form-oriented, typological urban structure and land use did not match the actual urban activities (p.97). Through underscoring the traces of design interventions, the chapter on case studies emphasises the formative process of urban spaces in different spatial typologies. For example, two places with the esoteric spatial type – Nikko and Kotohira – reflect the complex interaction between preexisting topography, environmental context, an axis of sequential spatial experiences, and the placement of symbolic elements along the axis. The diagram in the book showing the topography and vistas at Kotohira-gu links the topographic challenges the pilgrims encounter, urban fabric, spatial expanse and visibility, access to daylight, expected tiredness and feelings, and distribution of symbolic elements, revealing the conceptual intent to shape a journey of periodic discovery to keep pilgrims engaged in the experience. Such an observation of the distribution of elements and their effects on people strengthens the argument that effective integration of high-level urban design concepts can reach individual spatial and sensory experiences on the ground level. Furthermore, the investigation into the history of worship, emergence and flourishing of Kotohira, particularly in relation to the shift from the place of mountain worship to the popular destination for worshipping the god of marine rescue, supports the authors’ perspective that urban spaces are constantly influenced by broader societal, cultural and political flows and never stay fixed in one form or another. These case studies remind readers of the importance of a site-specific approach in urban design, considering the present circumstances as an accumulation of the past and the foundation for the future rather than a blank canvas for ‘new urban spaces’ to be imposed.

In conclusion, the book Nihon no Toshi Kukan is a thoughtful response to the history of urban design dominated by Western perspectives on urban development that have inflicted inflexible, top-down physical, functional and structural ideologies. The strong linkage between the theoretical standpoint of urban spaces as symbolic spaces and the contextual evidence supporting its pertinence in Japan reinforces the significance of intangible elements and their symbols that humans subconsciously acknowledge as part of spatial experiences. The understanding of urban design as a distribution of symbols, the “invisible city” that continues to shift and sway, enlightens readers to reflect on the palimpsest of memories in existing urban spaces and imagine its future as a continuum of time and space.