A short walk from Tokyo's upscale Ginza district stands a unique building that has attracted architecture fans and tourists for decades.
The Nakagin Capsule Tower was designed by the late Kisho Kurokawa. Japan's post-war Metabolism movement combined modern architectural thinking with ideas of organic biological growth and the extraordinary structure is a rare example.
The building will be torn down in a few days.
The Nakagin Capsule Tower, which resembles a precarious stack of front-loading washing machines, has been showing its age in recent years, and despite the long-running efforts of preservationists to save it, work on demolishing the structure will begin on April 12.
The building was built off-site and bolted onto two concrete shafts. In the beginning, Kurokawa suggested that the capsule should be replaced with new designs every 25 years, but in the end, none were removed.
As the building became more outdated and harder to maintain, some of the capsule became used for storage and office space, as well as more offbeat activities.
The technology that in the early 1970s would have been considered cutting edge has been modernized.
The architectural significance of the Nakagin Capsule Tower means that some of the capsule will be put on display in museums in Japan and around the world. Tokyo and the world of architecture are losing something special, and many are sad to see the structure go.
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