Yesterday, we had a chance to visit the Canadian Embassy, a building designed by our trip leader Raymond Moriyama. The ever-modest Mr M, after some cajoling, talked about a number of the concepts upon which the building's design is based. Ajon also had a hand in the building so he too was an excellent tour guide. The Embassy occupies four acres of prime real estate in Central Tokyo, across from the Imperial Palace Gardens. When the new building was built during Japan's real estate bubble in the late 80's, the land value was $5 billion. The $220 m building was built with no cost to the Canadian tax-payers by virtue of long term financing secured against the leasing value of the 3 floors of commercial space built beneath the Embassy. From the 52 floor of the Mori Arts Center, the Embassy appears as a dark trapezoid in the upper left of the photo, just below the green of the Imperial Gardens. The Embassy had to be designed so it cast its shadow on The Gardens for a maximum of two hours a day. Hence the unique shape of the top floors and roof of the 4 storey structure.
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