Est. MMXI

Atelier Meridian

Architecture · Kyoto — Copenhagen

Selected Works2021 — 2023

A low house of lime plaster and dark timber under one long roof, standing in morning fog behind a raked gravel court with a single stone.

Plate I

House Under a Long Roof

Shiga Prefecture · 2023

One roof held low over lime plaster. The garden is raked each morning, before the house is awake.

A quiet interior where tatami mats meet a polished concrete floor; fog-white light filters through a full-height timber screen beside a low dark bench.

Plate II

Tatami Hall

Shiga Prefecture · 2023

Tatami and poured concrete meet at a single seam. The screen divides the morning into even parts.

A pale fir stair rising along a lime plaster wall, held by a thin bronze handrail on slender posts.

Plate III

Stair for a Plaster Wall

Copenhagen · 2021

Douglas fir risers against lime plaster. The handrail is the only bronze in the building.

The same low house at dusk in thin mist, its plaster walls blue-grey, warm light showing through the timber entrance and one narrow window.

Plate IV

The Same Elevation, Nightfall

Shiga Prefecture · 2023

Thirteen hours after the first photograph. The house returns the light it kept.

A building is finished when nothing more can be taken away.

Practice note · Kyoto · 2014

The PracticeNine people, two cities

Atelier Meridian works between a machiya in Kyoto and a former sailmaker’s loft in Copenhagen. We accept three commissions a year. Most of our work is houses; all of it is slow.

Sawa Itō

Principal · Kyoto

Studied at Kyoto Institute of Technology and apprenticed in temple carpentry before founding the atelier in 2011. Draws every project’s first line by hand.

Mads Brandt

Principal · Copenhagen

Studied at the Royal Danish Academy; formerly of Dorte Mandrup Arkitekter. Keeps the practice’s models — and its calendar — honest.

The studio's long oak work-table holding a basswood model of the house, rolled drawings, a bronze scale rule and one small stone.
The long table, Kyoto studio.
  • Founded 2011
  • Nine people
  • Three commissions a year
  • Houses, mostly

EnquiriesIn order of arrival

We reply to every letter.

studio@ateliermeridian.jp

Kyoto23-4 Teramachi-dōri, Kamigyō-ku

CopenhagenStrandgade 14B, Christianshavn

The studio answers letters on Fridays.