LOCATION REPORT
K5 TOKYO Scandinavian and Japanese design sensibilities come together to transform a former bank in Tokyo’s financial district. Words: Mandi Keighran • Photography: © Yikin Hyo
T
okyo’s
Kabutochō
an unremarkable façade and they had intended
neighbourhood is rich in financial history,
Nihonbashi
to demolish it. As they began the process and
known as the site of the country’s first
the layers were stripped back however, they
bank and now home to one of the largest stock
uncovered a beautiful Western Neoclassical
exchanges in the world. It isn’t, however,
stone façade with Japanese detailing and
regarded as a particularly vibrant destination,
cavernous interior volumes that are highly
but that looks set to change with the opening
unusual in Japan. There was even original
of K5, a 20-key boutique hotel in a former bank
timber parquet flooring on the ground level,
opposite the stock exchange. Renovated by
and scribbled construction notes visible on the
Swedish architecture and design studio Claesson
walls and floors of the raw concrete.
Koivisto Rune (CKR), the structure has been
“By keeping the building as brutal as it is,
stripped back to its original fabric and brought
we have preserved a lot of history and created a
to life again with creative spatial planning and
contrast between the unfinished elements and
a sensitive palette of crafted materials.
the more refined glass and tiling,” says Ola
“This was the perfect project for CKR,” says
Rune, co-founder of CKR. “We also saved quite
Yuta Oka, co-founder of K5. “The hotel was a
a lot of money as we didn’t have to restore and
revitalisation project, putting the soul back into
clad all the existing surfaces.”
a century-old building, built in 1923 during the
In keeping with the theme ‘existing with
Taishō era. Not many Japanese people have done
nature in the city’, interiors – particularly the
that, but in Europe it’s more normal.”
ground floor – have been transformed into
When the developers bought the building –
an urban jungle by native plant nursery Yard
which survived the WWII fire-bombing of Tokyo
Works. “The owner came to us and said, ‘you’re
due to its concrete construction – it was clad in
putting life back into a dead pocket of Tokyo –
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