A Rewarded-Project Story from Japan: Comfort vs View in a Fancy Glazed Atrium

Systematic, sustainable design decisions, especially in the early stages, are vital to realizing the project objectives. However, in practice, such decisions seem to be intuitively made. Time limitations and unclear sustainability briefs are some of the causes, yet, the lack of clear decision-making roadmap remains a root issue. In response, this paper narrates an eight-month process of a nationwide-rewarded project in Japan, in which a sustainable design roadmap was developed. The roadmap is demonstrated by sharing a process that sought to balance the thermal comfort and view conflicting qualities; via manipulating the roof and side-shading enclosure parameters.