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Advancing monster building in Tokyo (part 2)

The urban battleship building is located in Okubo, a neighborhood within Tokyo’s Shinjuku ward. It is designed by the famous and controversial architect Yoji Watanabe (1923-1983). The high building, realized in 1970, consists of 150 prefabricated capsules made of sheet metal (see part 1).

The complex looks like a battleship (Gunkan) indeed, as it shows us the architect’s previous career as an officer of the Imperial Navy. Years later, in an unknown future, Watanabe's battleship building emerges as a monstrous urban machine, determined to grow out of and over the city.

The growing and expanding Gunkan is powerfully depicted in graphic lines and shapes from the manga universe. The bizarre building takes on extra-terrestrial proportions and breaks through the neighbouring buildings and reaches across the street. Its dimensions are now unimaginable. The greenish metallic monster pushes itself even further into the urban landscape of Okubo as the first batch of capsules launches.

Now far into Shinjuku, the brutal battleship building is visible. The sky is beginning to turn red and a monstrous sound swells: “Tokyo” *). Didn't Yoji Watanabe warn us already?: “When I built the Gunkan I aimed its guns at America.” Thus he seems to experience his triumph posthumously. His militaristic dream, cast in architectural and urban planning form, could come true.

Source:
RVDB Urban Planning (Amsterdam, August-September 2022).

Type:
Obscure cities.