Housing & Environmental Design Laboratory

Akihabara is often described through neon signs, electronics stores, anime shops, and train lines. Yet a closer look shows a district where everyday movement, small-scale commerce, infrastructure, and memory overlap in unusually dense ways. This 10-day fieldwork program in Akihabara, Tokyo brought Japanese students together with students from Thai universities to study the area through design surveys, observation, mapping, and discussion. The aim was not only to understand th

Aging is becoming a shared global reality, and one of its hardest challenges is not only medical. It is social. Many older adults live with shrinking circles of contact after retirement, bereavement, migration of younger family members, or reduced mobility. Over time, isolation can affect mood, confidence, daily routines, and cognitive health. Improving quality of life, or QOL, for older adults calls for more than care services alone. It also calls for places where elders fee

Waterfront life in Nonthaburi is not only a scenic subject. It is a living system where houses, canals, boats, markets, temples, drainage, and memory all meet at the water’s edge. From August 1 to 10, the survey focused on how people live beside water in Nonthaburi Province, Thailand, and how water landscapes shape daily routines, local identity, and future planning. The work matters because rivers and canals in the Bangkok metropolitan region face pressure from urban growth,

What happens in the mountains of Northern Thailand cannot be understood through a single story. Children’s education, family livelihoods, local identity, migration, coffee cultivation, and cultural memory all meet in the same hills. That is why the 38th Meeting on the Life of the Thai Mountainous People, held on October 3, carried meaning beyond a regular gathering. It brought attention to the lived realities of highland communities and asked how outside supporters, local res