In Japanese cuisine, a good chef strives to present the natural goodness of ingredients and doesn't distract the diner with unnecessary flourishes. The same approach can be applied to design, according to architect Yasushi Horibe, who begins every new project by carefully considering the site. He describes his aim in doing so as aru mono o ikasu, or to "work with what's there." more...

Color helps us navigate and understand our world. Colors, of course, can take on different meanings, and importance, in different cultures. That much we all know, but we far too often assume that the way people perceive and classify color is relatively stable across cultures. Actually, how color is conceived can vary in subtle ways, and, in one culture, can be classified in subtle shades unfamiliar elsewhere. One example is how what is known elsewhere as "green" has traditionally been considered, in Japan, a shade of blue rather than an independent color. For instance, the traffic light in the color we normally call green is called "blue" here. more...