Itō Toyoo Kenchiku Sekkei Jimusho, creator, architect.
Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects fonds, 1970-2011
3710 drawing(s)
Please contact ref@cca.qc.ca to make an appointment to access this collection
The Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects fonds, 1970 – 2011, documents the studio’s architectural work and involvement in selected exhibitions in the 1970s and 1980s. The records in this fonds represent 34 architectural projects, including built, unbuilt, and conceptual projects. The majority of the projects are located in Japan and are mostly documented through drawings as well as a limited number of videos, models, panels, textual records, and photographs. The fonds also contains records related to Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects’ participation in three exhibitions in the USA and the UK in 1978 and 1986.
Toyo Ito (1941 - ) is a Japanese architect. He was born in Seoul, South Korea, which was then under Japanese colonial occupation. He completed his studies in architecture at the University of Tokyo in 1965 and shortly after began working at the office of architect Kiyonori Kikutake [1]. In Tokyo in 1971, Ito founded the architectural studio Urban Robot (URBOT). In the 1970s, a time of rapid expansion in the housing industry in Japan, Urban Robot largely undertook residential projects, including Aluminum House (see project series AP226.S1.1970.PR01 in this fonds) and White U (see project series AP226.S1.1975.PR01 in this fonds) [2]. Urban Robot’s work in the 1970s is often interpreted as a critique of the future-oriented visions of the metabolism movement in Japan [2]. Toyo Ito has written that the studio’s early works, such as Aluminum House, came “out of a sense of unbearable frustration over the state of society and the city” [3]. In 1979, the studio changed its name from Urban Robot to Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects [4]. Over the years, Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects has employed a variety of architects and some of those whose work is documented in this fonds include: Kazuyo Sejima, Yoshiro Sofue, Toshiaki Ishida, Teruaki Ohashi, Takeo Higashi, Kazumichi Iimura, Midori Nada, Makiko Shibata, Masashi Sogabe, and Hirono Koike.In the early 1980s, Ito, along with Kazuyo Sejima, Yoshiro Sofue, and other staff members, formed the Commodified Housing Study Group [5]. The study group, which was active from about 1981 to 1983, critically engaged with questions surrounding the relationship between the housing industry, architects, and clients. The Dom-ino and Dom-ino Z projects (see project series AP226.S1.1981.PR01 in this fonds) as well as House in Umegaoka (see project series AP226.S1.1981.PR02 in this fonds) came out of the work of the study group [6]. In the 1980s, Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects also explored themes related to consumerism, urbanism, and technology through work such as Pao I: A Dwelling for Tokyo Nomad Women (see project series AP226.S1.1985.PR02) and Pao II: A Dwelling for Tokyo Nomad Women (see project series AP226.S1.1989.PR01 in this fonds) [7].The mid-1980s saw the studio begin to take on more commercial public projects in addition to private houses. Projects completed during this time include Ito’s family home Silver Hut (see project series AP226.S1.1982.PR02 in this fonds), M Building in Kanda (see project series AP226.S1.1985.PR04), Restaurant and Bar Nomad (see project series AP226.S1.1986.PR02), Tower of Winds Yokohama (see project series AP226.S1.1986.PR03), Guest House for Sapporo Breweries (AP226.S1.1987.PR01) and the MAC Commercial Complex (see project series AP226.S1.1987.PR02). It was also during the 1980s that Ito’s architectural style shifted from the forms that characterised his projects in the previous decade to a more fluid architecture [8]. This lighter and more fluid architecture continued with Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects’ works in the decades that have followed. Selected projects include the Odate Dome (1993), Sendai Mediatheque (2000), and Meiso no Mori Municipal Funeral Hall (2006). Additionally, from the 1990s, Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects began to take commissions for projects outside of Japan, including the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in London, UK with Cecil Balmond (2002), the Kaohsiung National Stadium in Taiwan (2009), and the Museo International del Barroco in Puebla, Mexico (2016) [9]. In response to the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Ito developed the Home-For-All initiative, a program which builds community spaces for victims of the disasters [10]. Additionally in 2011, Ito helped to establish the Toyo Ito Museum of Architecture (TIMA) in Imabari, Japan. The TIMA functions as a research and exhibition space and an architecture education centre for children through the “Ito Juku” project [11]. In 2013, Toyo Ito was awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize [12]. Apart from architectural work, throughout his career, Toyo Ito has also published articles, contributed to exhibitions and conferences in Japan, the United States, and across Europe, and has taken teaching positions at universities in the United States, UK, and the Netherlands [13].References:[1]. Andrea Maffei, ed. Toyo Ito : works, projects, writings (Electa architecture, 2002), 356. [2]. CCAchannel. “Find and Tell: Makoto Ueda on Toyo Ito.” December 1, 2023. YouTube video, 6:43. https://youtu.be/N-F8i0tq_Dk?si=_3dSYwBbt7w-WuAj [3]. Toyo Ito, “A Body Image Beyond the Modern: Is There Residential Architecture Without Criticism?” in Toyo Ito : works, projects, writings, ed. Andrea Maffei (Electa architecture, 2002), 348. [4]. Andrea Maffei, ed. Toyo Ito : works, projects, writings (Electa architecture, 2002), 356. [5]. Koji Ichikawa, “Bridging a Chasm,” CCA, accessed March 18, 2026, from https://www.cca.qc.ca/en/articles/83440/bridging-a-chasm[6]. Koji Ichikawa, “Bridging a Chasm,” CCA, accessed March 18, 2026, from https://www.cca.qc.ca/en/articles/83440/bridging-a-chasm[7]. Cathelijne Nuijsink. “Negotiating Comfort in the Metropolis: Peter Cook, Toyō Itō, and the Shinkenchiku Residential Design Competition, 1977 and 1988,” ABE Journal 18 (2021). Retrieved February 2, 2026, from https://doi.org/10.4000/abe.10444 [8]. Toyo Ito. Toyo Ito with Koji Ichikawa and Others : Meanwhile in Japan. Interview by Kōji Ichikawa. Translated by Susan Chikuba. (Montréal: Canadian Centre for Architecture, 2023), p. 27 – 28. [9]. Projects (n.d.). Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects. Retrieved March 19, 2026 from http://www.toyo-ito.co.jp/WWW/Project_Chronology/p_c_en.html[10]. John Hill (2015, March 11). Catching up with home-for-all. world-architects. Retrieved March 19, 2026 from https://www.world-architects.com/en/architecture-news/found/catching-up-with-home-for-all[11]. On the Opening of the Toyo Ito Museum of Architecture, Imbari (n. d.). TIMA Imbari. Retrieved March 19, 2026 from https://www.tima-imabari.jp/about/ [12]. Toyo Ito of Japan is the 2013 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate. (n, d.). The Pritzker Architecture Prize. Retrieved March 19, 2026 from https://www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/2013#laureate-page-972[13]. Andrea Maffei, ed. Toyo Ito : works, projects, writings (Electa architecture, 2002), 356. [14]. Toyo Ito of Japan is the 2013 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate. (n, d.). The Pritzker Architecture Prize. Retrieved March 19, 2026 from https://www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/2013#laureate-page-972.
Architecture Japan.
Architecture Japan History 20th century.
Architecture Japon.
Architecture Japon Histoire 20e siècle.
fonds (collections)
Itō, Toyoo, 1941- architect
Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects archives
Location: Library archives collection 321532
Call No.: AP226
Copy: 1
Status: Available
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