Ginza Place in Tokyo’s Chuo-ku---New Landmark Gives Sense of History and Technology--A new commercial building called Ginza Place has been constructed at the Ginza 4-chomecrossing, which can be described as the face of Ginza, a popular upmarket commercial area inTokyo. The outer façade uses more than 5,000 pure white aluminum panels in order to express
Japanese craftsmanship. The building is attracting attention not only for its beauty but also for
its state-of-the-art technology.
Ginza is an iconic commercial district in Tokyo. While department stores and brand shops line themain roads and offer the latest fashions, on the side streets there are old stores that have been doing
business for generations. Ginza values both tradition and elegance.
One of the symbols of Ginza is the Ginza 4-chome crossing. The four corners of the junction where
Harumi-dori and Chuo-dori avenues intersect are occupied by the Wako Main Store, the Ginza
Mitsukoshi department store, San-ai Dream Center, and now Ginza Place, a new commercial building
opened on September 24, 2016.

Ginza Place, a new commercial building, opened at the Ginza 4-chome crossing on September 24, 2016.
On the left is Ginza Mitsukoshi, which opened in 1930 and is one of Japan’s best known department
stores. On the right is San-ai Dream Center, which was completed in 1963. (Photo courtesy of NikkeiArchitecture)

The owners of Ginza Place are Sapporo Real Estate Co., Ltd. and Tsuzureya; the external façade,which appears like white porcelain, was designed by Klein Dytham architects (KDa); and the building
design and construction was handled by Taisei Corp. KDa is an architectural design office founded byAstrid Klein of Italy and Mark Dytham of Britain.

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A view of Ginza Place from theopposite side of the crossing.
The first (ground) floor facing
the junction is occupied by anautomobile showroom. The
glass windows mean thatpassersby naturally turn theirgaze to the cars displayed
inside. (Photo courtesy ofNikkei Architecture)

The building has 2 floors below and 11 floors above ground and is about 56 meters high. In thebasement there is the Ginza Lion Ginza Place restaurant. The first and second floors above ground areoccupied by the Nissan Crossing showroom of Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. On the third floor there is a caféthat can also be used as an event space.

The two basement floors of Ginza Place are occupied by the Ginza Lion Ginza Place
restaurant and have direct access to the subway. (Photo courtesy of Nikkei Architecture)

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International Hospitality and Conference Service Association (IHCSA)The first and second floors above ground are occupied by the Nissan Crossing
showroom of Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. Visitors can view cars that cannot usually be seen,
including concept cars equipped with state-of-the-art technology and historic cars fromNissan’s colorful past. (Photo courtesy of Nikkei Architecture)

On the third floor there is the Common Ginza event space and café managed bySapporo Real Estate. Art exhibitions and promotional events are scheduled to be held
here. The terrace looks out over the Ginza 4-chome crossing. (Photo courtesy ofSapporo Real Estate Co., Ltd.)The fourth to sixth floors are occupied by the Sony Showroom. Previously the Sony Showroom washoused in the Sony Building facing the Sukiyabashi crossing in Ginza. That building, which wascompleted in 1966, will cease operating at the end of March 2017, after which it will be demolished. Anew building is scheduled to resume business in 2022.

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On the fourth to sixth floors there is the Sony Showroom, Sony Store Ginza, and Sony
Imaging Gallery Ginza. Inside the store visitors can experience the feel of Sony products.
(Photo courtesy of Sapporo Real Estate Co., Ltd.)The seventh and eleventh floors are occupied by restaurants. The photo shows Bistro
Marx on the seventh floor, which is situated level with Wako Main Store’s clock andoffers a splendid night view of Ginza. There are terrace tables as well. (Photo courtesy ofSapporo Real Estate Co., Ltd.)

President Toshiyuki Ikoma of Sapporo Real Estate commented, “The floor space available for rent in
the standard floors of Ginza Place is only about 430 square meters, so it is certainly not very spacious.
But our aim is not a commercial facility with loads of products but a place where the emphasis is on
product experience and person-to-person exchange among visitors. We want to have a facility thatbrings together state-of-the-art technology and, as a base of transmission and exchange, attracts
people with not only product consumption but also events.” Sapporo Real Estate expects Ginza Placeto get around four million visitors a year.

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Sapporo Group and Ginza: Ties Going Back More Than Eight Decades
Ginza is one of the most iconic districts in Tokyo, and Ginza Place now stands in a prime spot there.
Let us take a look at the new building’s background.
The Sapporo Group, which owns the building, has longstanding ties with Ginza. Its Beer Hall LionGinza 7-chome restaurant, which opened in 1934, is still busily operating today, more than eight
decades later, as the oldest existing beer hall in Tokyo.

The Beer Hall Lion Ginza 7-chome restaurant opened in 1934 and is still
operating today, with the first-floor beer hall just as it was all those yearsago. The pillars were built in the image of barley seeds, and the circular
lighting represents the froth in jugs of beer. The mural behind thecounter is Japan’s first 250-color glass mosaic. Check it out when youvisit! (Photo courtesy of Sapporo Lion Ltd.)The Sapporo Ginza Building was completed at the Ginza 4-chomecrossing in 1970 and housed the Ginza Lion restaurant in its basement.
The building was demolished and replaced by Ginza Place. (Photocourtesy of Sapporo Breweries Ltd.)IHCSA Café

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Symbolism and Harmony Required in Design
In building Ginza Place, Sapporo Real Estate aimed to produce a “landmark creating tomorrow’sGinza” and a symbol that would make people “associate Ginza with the white Ginza Place.” At thesame time, the emphasis was placed on harmony and connectivity with the surroundings, andconsideration was given to linking stores in the building with those outside.
For example, as can be seen from outside, there is a terrace on the seventh floor. As a result of an
old regulation on the height of buildings in Ginza, which was set in 1919, almost all of the existingbuildings around the Ginza 4-chome crossing have a height of about 31 meters, which was themaximum. The seventh floor of Ginza Place is on a level with that regulation, so placing a terrace there
is an attempt to create harmony with the surrounding skyline.

Ginza Place as seen from the roof of Wako Main Store, with the seventh-floor
opening at eye level. (Photo courtesy of Nikkei Architecture)

The seventh-floor terrace looks over the crossing and offers a view of Ginza froma brand new angle. The opposite building is Wako Main Store, and on the left is
San-ai Dream Center, with Yurakucho beyond. (Photo courtesy of NikkeiArchitecture)
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International Hospitality and Conference Service Association (IHCSA)The Zen-Ginza Kai (All-Ginza Association) consists of more than 30 groups, including neighborhoodassociations and shopping district groups. When it comes to harmony with the townscape, Ginza is oneof the strictest areas in Tokyo. So the design of Ginza Place was only finalized after numerous
discussions between Sapporo Real Estate and others on the one hand and the Zen-Ginza Kai on theother.
In rebuilding the site, the key word of design proposed by Sapporo Real Estate was “craftsmanship.”In order to transform the beauty of traditional craftwork into modern expression, KDa designed theexterior façade on the motif of fretwork (interlaced ornamental design).
KDa made the following comment about the exterior: “In the white fretwork vessel, the depth of theluster on its elaborate surface gives a sense of the thoughtfulness of the makers, and the handwork
creates a feeling of warmth. It exudes that kind of beauty. We have poured in the times and will pass
the building on firmly to the next generation. We aimed for a structure with the kind of strength andwarmth you feel when you lift up a fretwork white vessel with both hands.”

Night view of Ginza Place, with itsbeautifully sparkling fretwork exterior.
The design features 410 full-color LED
lights that control the brightness andcolor at each opening. The lighting
can be altered to suit the season.
(Photo courtesy of Sapporo RealEstate Co., Ltd.)Mr. Keisuke Okamoto, chair of the Zen-Ginza Kai’s committee on town building, was full of praise,saying, “We made requests about a lot of things that must have consumed a lot of time and money,such as the appearance of the building’s glass. But they listened to everything and have constructed awonderful building. On the outside the graceful luster of white porcelain has been reproduced withmetal, and the sharp edges characteristic of metal express movement and flow. I’m sure it’s going tobecome a new landmark in Ginza.”

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5,000 Aluminum Panels Create Sense of Rising
Several new technologies developed by Taisei Corp. have been introduced in the Ginza Placebuilding. One is a vibration damper called the T-F Damper. This mechanism involves first of all using asteel plate to insert friction
material in the middle parts of
the intermediary pillars (notthe pillars supporting thestructure but those in the wallsubstrate).
Whenanearthquake occurs, this friction
material reduces the building’sswaying. A total of 28 dampers
have been installed from thefirst to seventh floors of Ginza
Place.
Mechanism of the vibration
damper introduced for the firsttime in the Ginza Place building.
The swaying of the building is
reduced by the friction material
inserted into the middle ofintermediary pillars using a steel
plate. (Courtesy of Taisei Corp.)

Ginza 4-chome crossing seen fromabove. Since the site is irregular, notso much floor space can be provided.
Therefore, rather than sales space,
the aim was to enhance services
through experience, exchange, andother activities. (Photo courtesy ofSapporo Real Estate Co., Ltd.)IHCSA Café

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Another new technology is the outer wall substrate system. In conventional engineering methods, thealuminum panels would be directly fixed to the structural frame or attached to the substrate. In the caseof Ginza Place, however, since the builders were pursuing a fretwork design expressing a sense ofrising, depending on the height, it was necessary to attach aluminum panels of different sizes to theouter wall. Among other things, that would make it difficult to coordinate the positioning of thesubstrates.
The new system developed to solve this problem uses parts with grooves as the substrate to beattached to the building. Special transoms (horizontal beams) with grooves were laid across mullions(vertical reinforcement beams supporting windows and so on) so that fasteners could be slid along thegrooves to install the aluminum panels.

Taisei Corp. developed an outer wall substrate system in order to realize the fixing ofaluminum panels of different sizes. Transoms with grooves are laid across the mullions, andthe aluminum panels are supported one by one by fasteners installed here and there.
(Courtesy of Taisei Corp.)

On the left is the mullion. A transom with grooves is laid across horizontally, andfasteners are inserted in accordance with the position of the aluminum panel. (Photo
courtesy of Taisei Corp.)
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There are fixed and movable fasteners. If the building sways and becomes disfigured in an
earthquake, strong wind, or the like, the unfixed fasteners will slide in line with the grooves and follow
the aluminum panels. This engineering method has been patented by Taisei.
Together with Wako Main Store, Ginza Mitsukoshi, and San-ai Dream Center, Ginza Place is one of
the “four architectural kings” of Ginza 4-chome crossing. With much thoughtfulness going into even thefiner points, the building fully deserves this title. It looks likely to become a symbol of Ginza as the areachanges in the future.
(Text by Yuiko Sugawara of Nikkei Architecture)

Nikkei Architecture
Launched in 1976, Nikkei Architecture is a general architectural magazine that carries wide-ranging
information from social and economic trends surrounding the architectural world to practicalmanagement, including specialized areas like design, structure, and construction. The magazine has
about 30,000 readers involved in architecture, including qualified first-class architects, architecturecompanies, and government officials. As well as the magazine, the Nikkei Architecture Web site(http://na.nikkeibp.co.jp/) provides timely information on the latest trends too.

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