Before I visited japan for the first time, I went to an exhibition on Japanese architecture where I saw a model of Fumihiko Maki’s Spiral building. In the design Maki had to accomodate a complex programme including a bar-cafe, a theatre, exhibition and music space under one roof. When I visited the building 3 months later I noticed that the programme was well defined. The name too, Spiral, was very clear: the elements spiral upwards almost effortlessly upwards throughout the building. But the exterior, the elements that I saw on the top of the model were only visibleif I had a bird-eye view, like I had with the model. Architecture, here I felt, was reduced to the creation of models, models that in the end (in its built form) would be nothing more than useless shapes wrapped around a programme. Did I witness the end of architecture, here in this prime example of bubble architecture? Was this inside-out architecture that still wanted some of the old glory: outside-in and wrap it together?
It is a well-known fact that during the Japanese real estate bubble in the mid 1980’s the cost of land was far greater than the construction cost of the building. Thus buildings such as Philippe Starck’s La Flame D’or a building of which the flame-like element on top seems to have cost more than the rest of the building. Due to the astronomical land prices, the cost of construction was marginal and in a way did not seem to matter. Philippe Starck is a designer, well-known for his furniture and the building has object-like qualities. The building reduced to a sign, in a city of signs, the end of architecture?