Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower

Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower, which contains 3 vocational schools with approximately 10,000 students, is an innovative educational facility located in Tokyo's distinctive Nishi-Shinjuku high-rise district. The building's elliptic shape, wrapped in a criss-cross web of diagonal lines, embodies the "cocoon" concept. Students are inspired to create, grow and transform while embraced within this cocoon-like, incubating form. In essence, the creative design successfully nurtures students to communicate and think creatively.

In designing Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower, Tange Associates offers a new solution for school architecture in Tokyo's tightly meshed urban environment. A new typology for educational architecture, the tower and accompanying auditoriums successfully encompass environmental concerns and community needs with an unparalleled inspirational design.

The high rise tower floor plan is simple.  Three rectangular classroom areas rotate 120 degrees around the inner core.  From the 1st to the 50th floor, these rectangular classroom areas are arranged in a curvilinear form.  The inner core consists of an elevator, staircase and shaft.

Unlike the typical horizontally laid out school campus, the limited size of the site challenged Tange Associates to develop a new typology for educational architecture. Student Lounges are located between the classrooms, facing three directions, east, southwest and northwest. Each atrium lounge is three-stories high and offers sweeping views of the surrounding cityscape. A new type of schoolyard, these innovative lounges offers students a comfortable place to relax and communicate.

The elliptic shape permits more ground space to be dedicated to landscaping at the building’s narrow base, while the narrow top portion of the tower allows unobstructed views of the sky. The nurturing forces of nature are close at hand to the student, an inspiring environment in which to study, learn and grow.  For the community, the fascinating design of Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower is a welcome contribution to the urban landscape and an example of how such design innovation benefits and impacts its immediate surroundings.