This proposal for Ireland House, Tokyo is designed to present Ireland as a cradle of innovation and contemporary technology.  Beyond this it will also be a beacon for the Irish community in Japan and those Japanese who share an affinity with Ireland. It is therefore a light box for Irish artists, business people, entrepreneurs and innovators. The building is an embassy, a cultural centre, a community meeting place: it is a showroom and source of knowledge about Irish culture.

The building design has been carefully orchestrated to remain within the limitations set by local regulations but yet optimises the available and allowable built area with a series of stacked (and occasionally cantilevered) glazed boxes; above the garden level at ground floor. Each level of the building has a distinct function within the brief.

The Energy and Environmental Strategy is an integrated building performance approach and will focus on ensuring occupant comfort, well-being and a high-quality building environment by way of energy efficient design, exploitation of natural conditioning, utilizing site-specific potentials and minimization of required conventional mechanical systems. In order to achieve this, the integrated building design will be based on the following key strategies:

• High performance of the thermal building envelope.
• Building integrated renewable systems for solar power generation by Photovoltaic.
• Optimization of natural daylight availability while providing individual glare protection.
• Integration of effective solar shading into the façade, protected from environmental impact (e.g. embedded within glazing units).
• Passive solar heating during winter.
• Radiant conditioning for optimized application of environmental heating and cooling sources (e.g. geothermal), ensuring a flexible, energy efficient and future-proof internal energy infrastructure.
• Heat recovery.
• Occupant controlled outdoor air ventilation rates.
• Integration of operable windows/façade elements for natural ventilation & cross ventilation.
• Adaptive summer comfort based on air movement and optimized conditioned fresh air supply as required.

HRA Open Competition Entry 2019