createYU

9 Hours

Designed in a collaboration with award-winning product designer Fumie Shibata of Design Studio S, the 9 Hours is the brand new capsule hotel launched in December 2009 by Tokyo-based Cubic Corp. It looks nothing like its predecessors and represents a revolution in the capsule concept. 9h, so called for the average amount of time visitors usually spend in a pod hotel.

“I used black and white because this hotel is about night and morning”

The themed is continued inside the rooms, with white towels and toiletries and black pyjama and slipper sets. The hotel website is also minimal and in the black & white color scheme.

Watch the hotel video on Monocle
9h Website

Public Art & Furniture in Roppongi Hills

“Roppongi Hills Public Art & Design Project” was launched to supply a key element in realizing the grand vision of Roppongi Hills as a cultural center in Tokyo.

For this large-scale project with the ambitious theme of creating a new and much-needed cultural center in the heart of the city, over twenty world-class artists and designers were specially commissioned to create works to be placed at sites around the community. Transcending the boundary between art and design, the exquisite yet functional works are shaping the creative landscape of this cultural center.

Karim Rashid in Roppongi Hills

sKape is an island of flowing color, designed as an extension of the Tokyo landscape. The signature curvatures of Karim. Really stands out at the same time adding vibrance to the area.

The urban landscape of Roppongi Hills contains many specially commissioned works of public art and design, which give the town vibrancy and color while affirming its role as a cultural center. Four of the works were chosen by David Elliott, Director of the Mori Art Museum, which is located within Roppongi Hills. A further three works were selected by architect Fumihiko Maki for installation in and around his TV Asahi building. Shigeru Uchida collaborated with 10 designers to produce 11 custom-made benches and one bus stop, all of which are arranged along a 400m stretch of Roppongi Hills’ main street, Keyaki-zaka Dori.

Counter Void

Digital numbers on a glass screen excite the imaginations of passersby. The Counter Void is an interesting one; we were fortunate to witness both how it looks during day and night time. The LED flipped from the Black on White to White on Black as soon as it turned dark. Inspirational piece!

Cuddliest Hero of Asia

When at TV Asahi in Roppongi, we couldn’t skip visiting our favorite hero of all times – Doraemon.

Doraemon (ドラえもん ) by Hiroshi Fujimoto, pen name Fujiko F. Fujio, is a Japanese manga about a robotic cat, Doraemon, who has travelled back in time from the future to aid a schoolboy, Nobita Nobi.

The stories first appeared in January 1970. They were simultaneously published in six different magazines. In total, 1,344 of the original stories were created. They are published by Shogakukan under the Ladybug (てんとう虫, Tentōmushi) comics brand, extending to forty-five volumes. They are collected in the Takaoka Central Library, Toyama, Japan, where Fujimoto was born.

Doraemon was awarded the grand prize of the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize (手塚治虫文化賞) of 1997.

Doraemon Resource