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Matsuura Lab
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An urban planning lab that revitalizes what already exists rather than building a city from scratch.
AboutAbout the lab
Rereading the existing city and reconnecting it.
The Matsuura Lab studies problems related to the planning and design of living spaces, from cities to farming and mountain villages.
Using fields near Chiba Prefecture as its setting, the lab carries out practical research and design work in collaboration with citizens, local government, and experts.
Rather than building something new from scratch, the lab reads existing towns, architecture, and local resources and translates them anew into today's context.
Its subjects include walkable towns, rethinking the use of road space, revitalizing shopping streets, and historic townscapes.
Key terms
- Stock Redesign
- Modifying and reusing existing buildings and public spaces, and redrawing a vision for the community's future
- Public-Private Partnership
- An approach in which local government teams up with actors in different positions, such as companies, citizens, and universities, to tackle local issues
- Local resources
- Things in a place, such as buildings, landscapes, and people's activities, that can serve as clues for community development
NewsLab news
Results of the joint research with Chiba City, "Study of the Future Vision for the Chuo Park Promenade," released as a video
Associate Professor Matsuura received the Architectural Institute of Japan Prize (Paper)
"Nishi-Chiba Urban Farming" and "Machi-isu" received an Excellence Award at the Chiba City Urban Culture Awards 2025
A lab project received an Excellence Presentation Award at the Architectural Design Presentation of the Architectural Institute of Japan Annual Meeting
A master's student received the Young Researcher Excellent Presentation Award in the Urban Planning division of the Architectural Institute of Japan Annual Meeting
ResearchResearch themes
Building on four foundations, "Stock Redesign," "Public-Private Partnership," "Design of Empathy," and "Design of Strategy," the lab works on the revitalization of cities and regions. A distinctive feature is that it treats urban design as an act of "translation" that reconnects parties with different positions and different languages.
*Illustrative imageStock Redesign
The lab values making new use of existing cities, architecture, and local resources rather than creating something new. Through design and management, it revitalizes aging facilities, vacant houses, and public spaces that are no longer used.
*Illustrative imagePublic-Private Partnership and the Design of Empathy
Actors with different positions, such as local government, companies, citizens, and universities, work together on local issues. Before institutions and systems, the lab's foundation is designing relationships of empathy between people.
*Illustrative imageDesign of Strategy
For problems that cannot be solved by improving a space alone, the lab designs everything from whom to involve and in what order to proceed, to how to sustain the effort. The work moves back and forth between survey, planning, practice, and evaluation.
*Illustrative imageUrban design as translation
The lab sees urban design as an act of moving between and reconnecting different things, such as experts and citizens, institutional systems and on-the-ground practice, and historical context and present-day needs, and it develops theory and methods for this.
MembersFaculty
The Matsuura Lab consists of faculty members and doctoral, master's, and undergraduate students.As of 2026
- Associate ProfessorKenjiro Matsuura
VoicesStudent voices
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Report an errorAbout the images
The top and research theme images are illustrative and were not taken at the lab. They are cropped from Wikimedia Commons images. Cropped CC BY-SA images are provided under the same CC BY-SA license as the original (version shown on each line).
- Top image: “Niso-Udatsu-no-Machinami ac (3)” Asturio Cantabrio / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Stock Redesign: “Renovated Gym in the Summit Center” RuralResurrection / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Public-Private Partnership and the Design of Empathy: “Dorchester Community Fridge” Saaadu18 / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Design of Strategy: “Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall” xiquinhosilva / CC BY 4.0 (cropped)
- Urban design as translation: “Milwaukee Ave Minneapolis 2” McGhiever / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Living Environment Creation Design Lab (Kasane Yuasa)): “Urban Escape at Petronas Learning Centre” Zakee Man / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Suzuki Lab): “An architectural model of the British Library” Robert-brook / CC0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Toyokawa Lab): “Marunouchi Central Plaza with blue sky, Tokyo station and Shin-Marunouchi Building, panoramic view from JP Tower, Tokyo, Japan” Basile Morin / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Usui Lab (Measurement and Analysis Lab)): “Karte Berlin Schwarzplan” Maximilian Dörrbecker (Chumwa) / CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped)
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