sou fujimoto to design pace's tokyo gallery in azabudai hills

pace to land in central tokyo with a new gallery space

Pace will soon land in Central Tokyo with a new gallery space designed by Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto. Expected to welcome visitors in Spring 2024, the three-story exhibition hub will be part of the city’s new Azabudai Hills development, taking over the lower floors of a building designed by British designer Thomas Heatherwick.

Pace’s interest in Tokyo dates to the late 1960s when founder Arne Glimcher first began regularly visiting the city to connect with local artists, curators, and collectors. In the following decades, Pace has remained deeply involved in Japan’s arts community. Marc Glimcher, CEO of Pace Gallery, sees this move as an opportunity to join Japan’s cultural landscape and, particularly, Tokyo’s mark on the contemporary art scene in Asia. ‘Pace’s artists have always held Tokyo and Japan to be a touchstone of artistic innovation, so offering those artists a home and a team in this endlessly dynamic city is incredibly exciting. Tokyo will also give us an opportunity to spend more time with our Japanese artists and collaborate more closely with our colleagues in other Japanese galleries, with whom we have had such long and productive relationships. We believe it is time for Japan to take its place again as one of the most prominent collecting communities in the world, and I hope that Pace can play an important role in that growth,‘ he shares.

Pace Tokyo will be part of the Azabudai Hills complex | all renderings © DBOX for Mori Building Co., Ltd

three-floor interior designed by sou fujimoto

The interiors of the Pace gallery in Tokyo —spanning three floors and approximately 511 square meters —will be designed by Sou Fujimoto (see more here), whose practice focuses on the symbiotic relationships between the human body, the natural world, and architectural design. In addition to the 279 sqm exhibition space split across the first and second floors, the third floor provides space for an outdoor sculpture along with a private terrace, integrated within the building’s landscaped design concept, which evokes an image of rolling hills.

This upcoming Tokyo gallery will be housed in Azabudai Hills, the newest project by Mori Building, specialists in urban redevelopment working primarily in central Tokyo. Azabudai Hills has been conceived as a ‘Modern Urban Village,’ or a compact city with a central plaza surrounded by lush greenery where people can connect, centered around a verdant green plaza. More than 35 years in the making, the development prizes sustainability and is powered entirely by renewable energy, with designs led by the likes of Thomas Heatherwick.

the interiors will be designed by Sou Fujimoto

Today, Pace has eight locations worldwide, including a European foothold in London and Geneva as well as Berlin, where the gallery established an office in 2023. Pace maintains two galleries in New York—its headquarters at 540 West 25th Street, which welcomed almost 120,000 visitors and programmed 20 shows in its first six months, and an adjacent 8,000 sq. ft. exhibition space at 510 West 25th Street. Pace represents some of the most important artists working today in Japan, including Lee Ufan, Yoshitomo Nara, Kohei Nawa, and teamLab.

spanning three floors and approximately 511 square meters