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Mr. Yoshida says, "I place importance on listening to the customer's needs and solving them through design, just like a doctor, and on clearly communicating the brand image through design. He began creating CG perspective when he was a student majoring in architecture, and used Shade3D for the first time while working on various space designs related to "beauty and health" at TAKARA SPACE DESIGN.
Since then, over the past 20 years, Mr. Yoshida has used Shade3D even after establishing his current office. KAMITOPEN (means "Paper and a Pen"), now in its 13th year, was named after his mentor's words, "You can do this job with just a pen and paper". Shade3D has been a great help in the design of many architectural spaces especially stores, from new buildings to redesigns.
KAMITOPEN handles designs of a wide variety of genres, including cafes, hotels, Japanese confectionery stores, and karaoke boxes. Also, overseas projects are currently underway in Seattle, Sydney, and Hong Kong. As Mr. Yoshida commented, "The characteristic of our customers is that many of them open multiple stores and grow significantly as we have had a long relationship", nana's green tea, for example, which is a cafe chain and is gaining popularity for its menu featuring matcha and Japanese green tea, has 80 stores in Japan and 20 stores overseas. KAMITOPEN has been in charge of space design of their stores and assisted in the opening of new stores not only in Japan but also in Shanghai, Hawaii, Seattle, etc.
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In their design work, they have a meeting to determine the concept at first, then create a rough hand-drawn sketch and exchange opinions freely, and when a certain direction is established, they start creating perspective. They share data towards complete, for example, the younger staff members models using Shade3D, and the more experienced staff members insert data to it. "The great thing about Shade3D is that the NURBS shape function allows us to freely create shapes and express with intuitive modeling, as if we were designing with clay. Even staff members who are new to Shade3D can become fully proficient within a month or so after joining the company", Mr. Yoshida commented.
In creating the perspective, they are conscious of accurately conveying details by making the image slightly brighter than the realistic expectation so that the view will match the one seen from human eyes and the difference between the image and the real view will be small, and Shade3D is used to make subtle adjustments for this purpose. "The atmosphere is very important in perspective. In order to express the purpose and intent of the client's request in the design, it is necessary to study the form under lively light and grasp the spatial image", he said. By creating the entire 3D perspective, even the parts that are not actually shown to the client, they are able to confirm their own image of the space and use it as a tool to create a beautiful space.
The "Solo Sauna," which he recently designed, is a facility for relaxing alone, unlike conventional saunas. The design of lighting effects, such as natural daytime light inspired by bathing and candlelight flickering in the room, were also realistically represented in perspective, which he says he could put his client's ideas into shape by using Shade3D. Since the COVID-19 pandemic occurred, people's needs for space have changed dramatically. Shade3D is expected to continue to play an active role as a tool to delicately grasp these demands and flexibly express them in design.
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| ▲Office of KAMITOPEN Architecture-Design Office Co., Ltd. |
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| ▲nana’s green tea Hawaii branch |
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| ▲Goodman Amenity space (Chiba) |
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