HOKI MUSEUM BY NIKKEN SEKKEI When we are astonished by a building, it is often because we don't fully understand it. In such a case, we strive to close the gap between what we see and what we already know of architecture. — Published 2012.0425
	ANATOMY OF METABOLISM The exhibit "Metabolism, the City of the Future" at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo is a major retrospective looking at Japan's most widely known and perhaps least understood modern architecture movement. Subtitled "Dreams and Visions of Reconstruction in Postwar and Present-Day Japan," the exhibit throws up images depicting a sci-fi world of floating cities, metropolises in the sky, and soaring geometric shapes and patterns repeated over and over with little apparent correspondence to the psychological needs of humans. — Published 2011.1214
	UIA WORLD CONGRESS 2011 There were fears that the great earthquake that struck eastern Japan in March 2011 would in some way lessen the UIA World Congress recently held in Tokyo by the International Union of Architects (UIA). — Published 2011.1026
	TOYO ITO IN JAPAN C.B. Liddell for ArchitectureWeek: A very simple question to start with. Maybe the answer will be complicated. How do you feel about being awarded the 2010 Praemium Imperiale? — Published 2011.0302
	CONFESSIONS OF AN ARCHITECTURAL JOURNALIST Hiroshi Nakamura is an affable, easygoing guy — so much so that he even lay down on the carpet to help me and a colleague to get the right picture for a previous article. Also, I think it's fair to say that he's going places as an architect. He certainly has the right background: five years with Kengo Kuma & Associates, a number of awards, and still only 35 years old. Plus, his architectural oeuvre seems to be cannily in step with the present-day ecological zeitgeist. — Published 2010.0317
	SUNTORY MUSEUM BY KENGO KUMA Kengo Kuma strikes a chord when he talks about the inspirations for one of his most successful projects: the new Suntory Museum of Art, built in 2007 into the side of the new Tokyo Midtown development. — Published 2008.0903
	TALKING WITH TANIGUCHI Some Westerners, when faced with Oriental creativity, have a tendency to get a little carried away. Instead of a balanced, rational approach, a tendency emerges to ascribe the aesthetic effect of what they see to some mysterious, spiritual force that is absent from their own culture, whether it be called Zen, Tao, wabi-sabi, or yin and yang. — Published 2008.0116
	KUROKAWA ART CENTER According to architect Kisho Kurokawa, the new National Art Center Tokyo is a perfect expression of his philosophy of symbiosis. Rather than trying to iron out irregularities and resolve contradictions into what he calls a "dull, flat harmony," his distinctly non-Western idea seeks to apply conflicts and tensions in positive ways to achieve interesting and energizing effects. — Published 2007.0404
	TOYO ITO INTERVIEW Japanese architect Toyo Ito is credited with influencing a generation of younger architects with his ideas about contemporary urban forms. While presenting some of his recent work at an exhibition at the Tokyo Opera City Gallery in 2006, he spoke with journalist Colin Liddell about his designs, his theories, and their origin. — Editor Colin Liddell: In all your buildings, you seem to be trying to get away from straight lines. Do you hate straight lines? — Published 2007.0110

C.B. Liddell