Context Designer, Project Director

Kotaro WATANABE splits his time between Tokyo and London, aiming to use design to weave stories rather than simply creating products. He has lived and worked in cities including Tokyo, Hong Kong and Brussels among other places.

Kotaro Watanabe

Art Director, Designer, Project Director

While majoring in design at the Tokyo University of the Arts, Kotaro Yamaguchi also gained experience as a designer in a wide range of visual design including graphic design, signage design, video design, and UI design. In 2014 he completed the post doctorate program at Tokyo University of The Arts, Graduate School of Fine Arts, Faculty of Fine Arts. He joined Takram in 2014. His Notable projects include art direction for “mimicries,” a children’s science education program by NHK E-Television. Recipient of D&AD Yellow Pencil, Good Design Award, 2014 Japan Prize The Best Work in the Pre-school Category (The Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications Prize).

Kotaro Yamaguchi

Designer

Terushige Enatsu aimed to become an illustrator during his college years. Later, he became interested in web design and graphic design, and followed a path in the design field. He joined Takram following a career at a web design company. At Takram, he is primarily engaged in UI/UX projects, and his notable projects include UI design for local guide apps by NTT Docomo. Graduate of Sophia University, Faculty of Economics Department of Management.

Terushige Enatsu

Design Engineer, Sound Designer, Project Director

Keisuke Oyama conducted research and development on sound design/musical interfaces while attending Keio University, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies. After graduation, he joined IMG SRC inc. where he worked on interactive installations/mobile applications as an engineer. Sharing Takram’s philosophy on working freely across the fields of design/engineering and software/hardware, he joined the company in 2015.

Keisuke Oyama

Branding, Visual identity, corporate identity

Brand

“Lemon Hotel” is an artwork / accommodation produced by Smiles Co., Ltd., with graphic and sound design by Takram.

Lemon Hotel

“Lemon Hotel” is an artwork/accommodation produced by Smiles Co., Ltd., with graphic and sound design by Takram.

A traditional Japanese house was renovated into an art installation that can only be appreciated as a pair. A visitor would have to wait for someone else to arrive if s/he came on his / her own. After the closing of the installation each night, the venue turns into a hotel, whose general manager himself cooks a dinner course full of local lemons.

“This artwork is not like a painting or sculpture, but intangible and intimate like a reminiscence of your adolescent days,” says Smiles. The logo represents this concept through softly shaped multilingual scripts with a copy of “pure & sour”.

Lemon Hotel was exhibited at Setouchi Triennale 2016. Visiting the art installation does not require reservations. 

Lemon Hotel

Project Information

Team