「Haus Hyazinth」- Inheriting A Poet’s Dream
In 1939, Tachihara Michizō passed away at age 24 due to complications caused by tuberculosis. He left behind many things from poems to an unfinished project he had.
Other than the poems he wrote describing the urban life, Tachihara also dreamed of being an architect, he was enrolled to the Architecture Deparmtent of the University of Tokyo. After graduating, he would join the Ishimoto Architectural & Engineering Firm.
Tachihara himself viewed architecture as “Man’s scramble to find God’s attributes” as noted on his graduation thesis, mainly influenced by his views of “the natural” and the “the artificial” as so often found in his poems’s imagery of urban life.
“Open the window: you can see the clouds floating; birds flying; you can see the tiles on the roof. I swear these are the most amazing things.”
- Tachihara Michizō, Letter to Ikuta Tsutomu (1935)
Tachihara’s architectural work was an inspiration to other architects such as Ōe Hiroshi, Tange Kenzō others. One project which Tachihara never got to finish was his Haus Hyazinth.
Photo from Tachihara Michizō Memorial Society
In a letter to his classmate, Tachihara told his friend about his grim outlook about his later years, dreaming about spending his life in a house by a swamp in Urawa, Saitama. At that time many of Tachihara’s friends lived in Urawa including the poet Jinbo Kōtarō, the painter Kokuta Suda and Satomi Akimasa. With this, Tachihara decided that he wanted to build the house around the Bessho-numa park located at Saitama.
On a different letter directed to Jinbo, Tachihara would decide to name the House as “Hyacinth House”, stylized as “Haus Hyazinth”. In total Tachihara made around 50 designs according to his letters but decided on the design shown in the picture above, however due to his tuberculosis getting worse, he was unable to continue the project.
Inheriting A Poet’s Dream
After the poet’s death, an association was set up to bring the poet’s dream house to life. The Hyacinth House Association was set up in order to build the Haus Hyazinth, the house would later be completed in the year 2004.
The house was about 16.5 square meters with simple furnishing including a bed and a table for writing. The dimensions and design of the house followed closely to the designs sketched up by Tachihara during this tenure in designing the house.
While Tachihara is a rather obscure poet in comparison to many other characters in Bungō Stray Dogs or any other Bungō series for that matter. I still find it heartwarming about those who still remember a writer’s works and helping them attain their dream. Even if that dream is something as simple as a house for Tachihara to spend his weekends at.
[関連出版物の通信販売]. Tachihara Memorial Hall
[ヒアシンスハウスについて]. haus-hyazinth.org
[ヒアシンスハウスを見る ]. 近代建築の楽しみ
[Despite early death, poet’s dream home built 65 years later]. VOX POPULI Column of Asahi Shimbun
The Poetry of Architecture Doomed: Michizo Tachihara’s Neo-classicism during the 1930’s by Hiroshi Emoto
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