EXHIBITION | The 20th-Century Architects Who Redefined Modern Living

An exhibition titled "Living Modernity: Experiments in the Exceptional and Everyday 1920s–1970s" is presently being held at the National Art Center, Roppongi, Tokyo. It will run until June 30.

The exhibition explores seven fundamental challenges faced by architects, which are hygiene, materiality, windows, kitchens, furnishings, media, and landscape. It examines them by focusing on 14 masterpieces of residential architecture that were designed and constructed within the middle decades of the 20th century.

The six-decade time period that the exhibition covers commenced shortly after the termination of World War I (1914-1918) and concluded at the birth of the personal computer age. It was a time of great growth, innovation, and the development of physical infrastructure. It includes the post-World War II baby boom during which suburbanization became rampant.

The locations of the 14 residential masterworks span the globe and are generally open to the public as architectural museums. The featured works include:

Villa Le Lac, built on the shore of Lake Geneva by legendary architect, Le Corbusier, for his parents in 1923.
Chochikukyo, the groundbreaking residence in Kyoto designed by Koji Fuji in 1928.
Lina Bo Bardi Glass House in Sao Paolo, Brazil, was constructed in 1951.
The Murtala Experimental House, a summer house designed by Finnish architect Alvar Aalto in 1953.
The Frank and Berta Gehry House, an existing dwelling that American architect, Frank Gehry, concerted into his residence in 1978.

*Frank Gehry, Frank & Berta Gehry House, 1978 (©Frank O Gehry. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (2017.M.66))*

20th-Century Innovations

Perhaps the most significant factor driving architectural change in the early 20th century was sewage. One of the many casual terms for a toilet is an outhouse. Toilets were once precisely that: unattached to the principal dwelling due to hygiene and odor considerations.

Sewerage infrastructure enabled them to be brought into the house itself, which architects were then required to incorporate into their designs.

Windows and materiality are also related to the issue of hygiene. Large windows were made possible by advancements in structural members and the strength of glass. This brought natural light into households and allowed for improved air circulation. Improvements in materiality also allowed architects to span wider spaces at lower cost, which allowed for larger rooms and higher ceilings.

Kitchens were greatly transformed by the development of appliances. At a March 20 symposium that was held to accompany the exhibition opening, Patrick Moser, curator of Vila Le Lac, explained how visitors are frequently surprised by how small the kitchen is.

In 1923, explained Moser, there were no fridges nor household ovens. Moreover, there was little gastronomic tradition in Switzerland. People merely ate in order to survive. A kitchen was a secondary zone, he suggested, like a laundry of the present day.

*After entering the gallery, the exhibition is first visible through a replica of the window that runs the length of Vila Le Lac. The National Art Center, Tokyo, 2025. (©Kazuo Fukunaga)*

The Family Focal Point

In the post-WWII years, the kitchen became a social space, and efficiency gave way to the pleasure of preparation. The advent of the television provided an even more specific point of focus for the family.

Where once families had gathered around the fireplace or the wireless (radio), their orientation became directed towards the singular visual focal point of the television screen. This fundamentally altered the layouts that architects designed.

The exhibition's media section identifies housing exhibitions and architectural magazines as two methods through which architectural developments were initially brought to the public eye.

A primary significance of glossy architectural magazines is that they introduced the concept of the dream house to affluent home buyers. The vision and budget of well-to-do clients enabled architects to innovate and experiment to even greater degrees.

An Open-Plan Exhibition

The 14 residential masterworks through which these challenges are demonstrated are all largely open-plan, as is the exhibition gallery layout. There is no exhibition route. The visitor is free to meander between a series of display islands.

The exhibits include architectural drawings, models, films, and photos of both exteriors and interiors. Furniture is also displayed. Additionally, within a separate gallery, a full-scale mockup of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's unrealized "Row House" project (1931) has been constructed.

Adjoining is a display of historically significant (and exceedingly comfortable) chair designs that visitors are free to sit upon. This gallery is free of charge to all visitors.

*Installation view of the exhibition “LIVING Modernity: Experiments in the Exceptional and Everyday 1920s-1970s”. The National Art Center, Tokyo, 2025. (©Kazuo Fukunaga)*

Relationship with Nature

The masterworks are typically located within natural settings, and thus have the sense of being stand-alone artworks, rather than parts of a neighborhood or community. Their positioning within nature, however, has significance for the 1920s–1970s timeframe.

In the 19th century, many industrializing societies viewed nature as a resource or an obstacle to be overcome. WWI (1914–1918) was a conflict in which the landscape of battlegrounds was fundamentally altered by trenches and bombardment.

The conservation movement was largely nascent before 1980. The 1960s and 70s were a time when many urban architectural gems were knocked down and replaced by nondescript glass towers. The commitment to work with nature, that is displayed within the fourteen masterworks, was uncommon for the era.

Sustainable Living

At the symposium, Marcelo Carvalho Ferraz, presenting on the Lina Bo Bardi Glass House, suggested that the message of the exhibition should be that a sustainable relationship with the natural world is possible.

A further key thought was expressed to JAPAN Forward by Timo Riekko, Chief Curator of the Alvar Aalto Experimental House. When commenting on the property's lakeside sauna, he joked that in Finland, it is always important to complete construction of the sauna first. Other "less necessary requirements," such as bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchens, can come later.

At the symposium, he also thanked Tokyo for its beautiful Finnish spring weather (on the previous day it uncharacteristically snowed). The diversity of influences and regional styles that the exhibition seeks to present is nicely encapsulated by Riekko's dry humor.

*The Lina Bo Bardi Glass House — a dwelling encompassed within nature. Lina Bo Bardi, Casa de Vidro, 1951.*

A Less Communal Future

In the present day, the television is no longer the focal point of the family. Each member sits scattered and glued to their own device. Many young people do not have televisions at all.

Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic experience has made remote work routine, creating a greater need for private rather than communal space within the home.

The adjustment of architects to these newfound challenges will be interesting to view over the coming years. But innovate and adjust they will, as they have always done, and as this exhibition clearly shows.