架洲
Kakeshima™
A digital island for testing the future, with all of Japan condensed into it
Kakeshima: an island for testing the future, with all of Japan condensed into it.
From advanced urban infrastructure to local communities, every scale of Japan can be tried here at once — and industry, government and residents alike keep putting futures that don’t yet exist to the test.
01
The Island
About Kakeshima
Kakeshima is a virtual island, compact enough to fit within 15 kilometers square, built with reference to real landscapes all over Japan. The bustle of big cities and regional towns, quiet fishing villages and peaceful farmland, hot-spring towns in the mountains and seaside resorts — the many faces of the real Japan are condensed into one. Travel around the island and you may come upon a view you feel you have seen somewhere before: a downtown crowded with towers, the shopping street of the town you grew up in, or the mountains and lakes you once saw on a trip.
Map
The whole of Kakeshima is designed at a scale of 1:10,000, with contour lines every 10 meters reproducing every rise and fall of the land. The maps also go back beyond the present to the early modern and modern eras, layering how the land was used period by period, so the city shows its depth in its buildings, its road network and its changing land use. Every town and village has a story of its own, and those stories connect through the island’s terrain and transport network, making a stage where time seems to flow wherever you look. Building-level research based on real Japanese cities, and an urban structure designed down to the local economy and the routes visitors take, give the whole island its realism and credibility.
Scenes
The entire island runs in real time in Unreal Engine while staying true to the map
02
Areas
Shiohama 潮浜
Shiohama is a redevelopment district on the waterfront of Owatari City. Once a port area of rail lines, warehouses and factories, it began to change around 1980 as they moved away or scaled down. Close to the city center and with land to spare, it was chosen to become a new downtown, planned as a large mixed-use district of offices, recreational facilities and housing — and development continues today. Minato Park, which preserves remains from the port’s opening in the Meiji era, makes the area a landmark where everyday leisure and history meet.
Homidera 穂見寺
Homidera grew up as a temple town at the gate of an old temple. Standing where highways to every region cross, it flourished in the Edo period as a post town and a hub of transport and trade. Sake brewing and silk farming developed early, followed after the war by the automobile and semiconductor industries. Today, as car travel draws people out to the suburbs, the old town center is hollowing out and its population is aging.
03
Future
Picturing the future
From here, Kakeshima will reach into many fields as a stage for visualizing the “future concepts” lying dormant in society.
Within 15 kilometers square, the island condenses a wide range of settings, from ultra-dense urban centers to dwindling villages that live close to nature. That lets us show, seamlessly and in one world, how a single technology or service would look in the city and how it would work in the countryside.
We can picture a future city where cutting-edge technology not yet in common use has spread, carefully rebuild each region’s vision of its future, or put a product in place ahead of its release and show it at work. The results can take many forms, from VR experiences to vision movies.
“We want to try out the future in the world of Kakeshima.”
If that sounds like you, we would love to hear from you.
Case 01
High school students use Kakeshima to present ideas for their city’s redevelopment plan
Details coming soon
04
Updates
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