A Moss-Covered Earthen Roof Shapes the Sekiyuan Teahouse Waiting Area in Japan

A Moss-Covered Earthen Roof Blends Architecture and Landscape

The Sekiyuan Waiting Area in Ichihara City, Chiba, is a small architectural gesture with unusually rich cultural depth. Designed and built by Kurosawa Kawara-ten together with an architect and an artist—none of them professional builders in the traditional sense—the structure is a quiet but significant exploration of how informal building practices can contribute to contemporary architecture.

The project was carried out under a DIT (Do It Together) methodology, emphasizing collective craftsmanship, material experimentation, and a return to tactile construction. Rather than relying on industrial processes, the team worked with what the site offered, particularly the earth excavated from its own foundations.

This excavated soil was mixed into the mortar that covers the building’s distinctive deformed single-slope roof, which is supported at only three points. No waterproofing layer was added intentionally, allowing the roof to retain moisture, weather naturally, and gradually become fully moss-covered, creating a living, ever-changing surface.

The effect is an architecture that transitions, over time, into a piece of landscape.

Spatial Etiquette and Subtle Rituals: Architecture for the Tea Ceremony

The Waiting Area sits next to a traditional tea room, functioning as the transition point between the everyday world and the highly choreographed world of the Japanese tea ceremony. Every detail is engineered to support this cultural ritual.

Key spatial strategies:

• A lowered rear roof edge encourages visitors to bow slightly as they enter, echoing the humility central to chanoyu (tea culture).

• The diagonal opening of the roof guides visitors through a narrow alleyway, establishing a clear movement sequence.

• The informality of the structure reduces hierarchical distinctions—everyone must pass through the same modest threshold.

These gestures echo the tea ceremony’s ethos: attention to subtlety, reverence for process, and an awareness of how physical movement shapes mental states.

Moss-covered Earthen Roof - Raw Materials and the Craft of Making

The project draws heavily from the existing garden layout designed by Takeda-ya Sakuteiten, which introduced irregular brick paths, tile fragments, and small seating elements. The architects embraced this informal landscape language and extended it into the architecture itself.

Construction became a hands-on research process:

• Timber beams were manually cut.

• Components were carved on-site.

• Soil was excavated and turned into mortar.

• The roof was shaped and layered by hand.

The resulting structure feels intentionally unfinished—a counterpoint to the polished, hyper-regulated nature of contemporary construction in Japan. The slightly suspended mortar-and-earth roof introduces a subtle tension: it appears delicate, almost hovering, which heightens visitors’ awareness as they approach the adjacent tea room.

Rather than aiming for perfection, the project embraces imperfection, instability, and material honesty—qualities deeply rooted in Japanese aesthetics such as wabi-sabi.

Informal Architecture as Cultural Resistance

The Sekiyuan Waiting Area is more than a charming teahouse accessory—it is a statement. In an era where construction is increasingly dominated by industrial precision and regulatory constraints, the project advocates for amateur participation and site-responsive experimentation.

This small structure becomes a prototype for:

• Reintroducing play and experimentation into building culture.

• Encouraging communities to take part in shaping their own environments.

• Demonstrating how non-essential, small-scale architecture can host radical ideas.

• Reclaiming slow, manual processes in a fast-paced world.

By using readily available materials and collaborative labor, Kurosawa Kawara-ten positions DIT construction not as nostalgic revival, but as a future-forward alternative—one that restores conviviality, community skill-sharing, and a deeper understanding of materials.

Written by Otávio Santiago, a designer crafting visual systems that move between the tactile and the digital. His work combines motion, branding, and 3D exploration with a poetic sense of structure.