Sukiya Style

数寄屋 / 16th century– / Style / Historical Styles

The light, informal residential style born of tea-ceremony aesthetics: slender posts, bark-edged timber, earthen walls and shoji light that let material nature and empty space become the quality of the room. Katsura became modernism's pilgrimage site.

Sukiya Style — Katsura Imperial Villa (CC BY-SA 3.0) · © John Chang
Katsura Imperial Villa (CC BY-SA 3.0) · CC BY-SA 3.0 · © John Chang
Sukiya Style — Shokintei, Katsura Imperial Villa (CC BY-SA 4.0) · © Dumas Roger
Shokintei, Katsura Imperial Villa (CC BY-SA 4.0) · CC BY-SA 4.0 · © Dumas Roger
Sukiya Style — Window of the Shokintei (CC BY 4.0) · © Carlquist, Sherwin John, 1930-2021
Window of the Shokintei (CC BY 4.0) · CC BY 4.0 · © Carlquist, Sherwin John, 1930-2021

At a glance

Visual cues

  • Slender posts, light roofs
  • Bark-edged timber and earthen walls
  • Diffuse shoji light
  • Continuity with the garden

Best used for

  • Designing a tatami room or inn suite toward ease rather than formality
  • Raising a small garden facing room through light and material alone

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Dictionary entry

Type
Keep posts slender and leave bark edges and knots showing
Composition
Guide the eye with alcove and opening, leaving generous emptiness
Material
Earthen wall, shoji paper, bamboo and washi diffusing light into shadow
Caution
Swapping materials for Japanese ones while keeping western ceiling heights and opening sizes never produces the lightness, and the room stops at Japanese style decor.
Further study
Katsura Imperial Villa / Bruno Taut's 'discovery' / Isoya Yoshida's modern sukiya

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