Duke Matsukata's residence in Oyamacho, Mita (January 1905) [Things that change and things that don't]

This time, I would like to introduce a Renaissance-style Western-style building that was completed at the main residence of Josiah Conder in Oyama-cho, Mita. Among the remaining drawings, there were a plan and two elevations. Comparing it with old photographs taken after completion, it seems that the elevations are the original plan and the revised plan. Perhaps at the request of the client, the plan was changed, and the neat facade, which was conscious of symmetry in the original plan, was changed to an asymmetrical one. However, if you look closely at the drawings, you will notice that the span arrangement around the balcony entrance and the details of the window frames have not changed. Even though the plan has changed, Conder's design vocabulary has been properly preserved. This is information that cannot be revealed from photographs, and it is exactly the message that the surviving old drawings convey to the present. Incidentally, the building that was rebuilt after being burned down during the war is today's Italian Embassy. There are no traces of the Matsukata residence in the building, but traces of the Meiji period are preserved everywhere in the garden.