Enjoy simple pleasures. That, in essence, is the idea behind Japanese minimal retailer MUJI’s new project: MUJI HUT. Unveiled during this week’s Tokyo Design Week, the concept seeks to provide people with the very basics – a roof over their head – to do the things that city life sometimes doesn’t allow.
Enjoy being alone, reading a book, listening to the sound of rain, or appreciating nature, proposes the minimalist lifestyle brand. Or just get lost in your own thoughts. To help you accomplish this, MUJI has teamed up with 3 notable designers to design 3 types of huts that can be easily and cheaply installed in the great outdoors.
The first to hit the market will be Naoto Fukasawa’s Wooden Hut. In the pipeline are Jasper Morrison’s Cork Hut and Konstantin Grcic’s Aluminum Hut. All were on display from October 30 – November 3, 2015 at Tokyo’s Midtown Garden.
The humble abodes will begin being selling in 2017 and are estimated to go for between 3 – 5 million yen (roughly $25,000 – $40,000). That wouldn’t include the cost of land, but at that price owning a vacation home sounds a lot more affordable!
Naoto Fukasawa’s Wood Hut
“When I hear the word hut, I’m attracted,” says designer Naoto Fukasawa. It’s not quite a villa but not as simple as a tent. With a small hut you can burrow into the wilderness whenever you want.”
Jasper Morrison’s Cork Hut
“Whenever I think about going to the country for the weekend, I start imagining a small house with everything needed for a short stay,” says Jasper Morrison. “The dream usually collapses when I think of the complexity of building a new house, but with this project I realized there was a chance to design such a house as a product rather than a one-off.”
Konstantin Grcic’s Aluminum Hut
“The hut is just a space — it doesn’t have to be a fully functioning place for living,” says Grcic, whose the hut uses the same lightweight technology and fabrication system as delivery trucks. “There doesn’t have to be water or electricity. It is just a space for doing something.”
November 6, 2015 at 9:51 pm
Love Naoto Fukasawa’s Wood Hut. Would be great to see these made available export markets via local distributors.
November 6, 2015 at 10:16 pm
hello,
Always love your articles on Japanese design.
Keep up the good work!
November 9, 2015 at 4:20 am
Boo to this article! Woodsmoke is a source of toxic air pollution! And since when does one need $25,000 to enjoy the great outdoors?!
November 9, 2015 at 9:41 am
Maybe you should add some watermarks to the pictures or something, I keep seeing your stuff elsewhere.. (in this case, clearly the images are from MUJU, but they also copied part of your text..)
http://9gag.com/gag/aRVWrAB
November 9, 2015 at 11:03 am
Sey – thanks for alerting us to this! As you can imagine, it’s a difficult issue to combat 🙁
November 10, 2015 at 1:13 pm
Makes me want to get a couple of acres in the woods somewhere and a 1/2 dozen of these small homes/huts and start a colony of cool people who can live small but think big. Love it. Thank you! M.
November 17, 2015 at 4:22 pm
Very cool! The furniture items remind me of some of the pieces that I bought at memoky.