Japanese design legend Kenzo Takada’s 13,778 sq. ft. Parisian home is up for sale
The former Parisian home of Kenzo Takada, the legendary Japanese fashion designer, is up for sale with Belles demeures de France, affiliate of Christie’s International Real Estate.
In 1988, Kenzo Takada, a late Paris-based Japanese fashion designer, built this four-level contemporary house in Paris' trendy 11th arrondissement.
This home was built over seven years and completed in 1993. It's hidden in the courtyard of an 18th-century building in the Bastille district, just steps away from the trendy Marais neighborhood.
Built around its own interior courtyard, the cedar-clad residence is anchored to nature by landscaped terraces that include a stone pond with nishiki carp in a traditional Japanese garden. It houses 18 rooms, seven bedrooms, two full baths and seven partial baths.
Like his fashion, Kenzo conceived his house as an eclectic convergence of East and West, cultures and art, and a reverence for nature – an ode to the designer's Japanese-French heritage. In 2018, the house was redesigned by celebrated architect Kengo Kuma, known for grand projects such as Japan's National Stadium and the Suntory Museum of Art in Tokyo. The renovation kept the same vision alive.
To add texture and warmth to the façade, Kuma used cedar shingles, teak, and clay. French oak louvers, beams, and floors complement the original wood finishes inside. Kuma rearranged the layout, making each room transparent and orienting it towards the garden. An engawa, a traditional Japanese exterior corridor made from wooden lattice, replaces the indoor lap pool. A Japanese pavilion with tea ceremonies, tatami mats and shoji sliding doors opens to a koi pond. Cherry and maple trees, bamboo, junipers, lichens, mosses, rocks and waterfalls mimic the Japanese landscape's calm and serenity.
Marie-Hélène Lundgreen of Belles demeures de France, comments “Kenzo House is without rival in Paris, built 35 years ago by Kenzo Takada and masterfully updated for the 21st century by architect Kengo Kuma, it is a world apart.”
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