The different floor plan design, compare between Thai and Japanese Architecture in each country is different. It is depend on various factors such as lifestyle, social, culture, economy and so on. Compare to other countries in Asia, Japanese house is the one which have unique characteristic. In this essay, I will explain what difference between Japanese and Thai house plan
1. Sharing space: corridor/ living area / kitchen
- For this area, in Japanese house, after you take you shoe off, you will find a step to go up to corridor, but in Thai, we don't have any step. We separate between foyer and corridor only by material, no step.
- Then, from corridor if you want to go to living room, you need to open a door first, while Thai floor plan, the corridor is linked to living room, no door. Air and lighting can flow from living area to corridor. Maybe because of cold weather, so Japanese house must have the door in order to separate each area. As a result, corridor in this plan, lack of natural light.
2. Bedroom
If we compare between Thai and Japanese floor plan by the same total area, housing unit in Japan is divided into many small bedrooms more than Thai. It is smaller than Thai bedroom. As we known that, Japanese sleep on Futon which place on floor, it is folded and keep in a cupboard after they use it. Then use the floor for other activity such as living, eating etc. Furniture in bedroom is designed by eye level when user sits down on the floor while Thai is different.
Thai usually sleep on a bed which is designed in standard size relate to western human scale. It is quite big, rigid object, as a result we have to prepare big bedroom for it.
3. Toilet
From floor plan, we can see that Japanese separate flush from toilet .It's good if one want to use flush and one want to take a bath at the same time. While Thai group flush and shower area together and prepare private toilet within master bedroom which separate from other because one who live in this room is the most senior. It very convenience if we have toilet more than one because another one can use another toilet at the same time .You can imagine that everybody must go out to work or study as fast as they can in the morning because of traffic and some family, they go together by the same car. Compare between Japanese and Thai, no need bathtub for Thai because weather in Thailand is quite hot, only shower is enough. For washing machine, Thai floor plan, it is placed it in kitchen area which is not suitable much. Smoke when we cook can make our clothes that we prepare for washing dirty.
4. Tatami room
Tatami room is the one of Japanese house characteristics. In this case, Tatami room is an extra room that may use for dinning, hang out with friends, or space for visitor who want stay overnight. In Thailand, if we have space enough, we will turn it to study room or mini office.
5. Balcony
At balcony, In Japan, designer must prepare fire exit in this area by make a hole at floor and connect each floor by use fold able ladder, while Thai is not. However, both Thai and Japanese use this area for dry their cloth.
6. Kitchen
In this case, kitchen in Thai floor plan is located in front of the room . It is different form the past that kitchen must locate outside the house because smoke. Because ,nowadays, we can buy food from market, warm it by microwave, so no need to separate it anymore.
In conclusion, I believe that floor plan can represent user's life-style ,social, culture and weather for Each country . For example, for the door that block between corridor and living area, because of weather in Japan is quite cold than Thailand. If you are foreigner ,you should to adapt yourself to new house, or adapt you new house suitable for you.
