What a Japanese apartment looks like: three unusual features of Japanese housing

Who has not heard of tiny Tokyo apartments - one-meter high cabins, but long enough to lie? While these types of spaces exist, they are fairly extreme exceptions. Only those who are not indifferent to proximity to the center or work live in them.

Contrary to their appearances, their prices are not among the lowest. Although apartments in a good location in Japan are expensive, you can rent much more comfortable apartments for the same amount. small studio apartments in other areas of the city, well connected to the city center by an extensive network of metro and expressways railways.

What features does Japanese housing have? We decided to check it out.

1. The surface of the apartment is measured on a tatami

A tatami is a rug that is laid on the floor of an apartment or house. Made from rice straw. The tatami mats have a standard size of 90 × 180 × 5 cm, although there are other size rugs.

It is worth knowing that the size of Japanese apartments and rooms is determined not in meters, as is customary in Russia, but in tatami.

2. Watch your step!

Do not enter a Japanese home with your shoes on. It is usually left in a place called a genkan, the equivalent of a corridor in a house or apartment below floor level. Its size depends on the surface of the apartment - in the smallest it will be a relatively small space with the width of the front door and somewhat shorter length. In more respectable apartments and houses, this may even be a separate room.

When removing and putting on your shoes, be careful not to stand barefoot on the genkan or put your shoes on the floor, or worse, on the tatami.

3. Savings Above All

An interesting and, above all, ecological solution is often found in miniature toilets of the Japanese. The hand wash sink is installed (never believe) above the toilet cistern! After using the toilet, you can wash your hands with clean water flowing from a small faucet filling the empty toilet tank. Therefore, this water is used twice - first for washing hands and then for flushing in the toilet. Isn't that smart?