When humans one day live in space, I’m sure we’ll make use of the experience Japan has gained with fitting people into smaller spaces. Since Japan has a little less than half the population of the U.S. crammed into an area the size of California, they’ve come up with some interesting ways of making do with less elbow room, such as constructing restaurants up off the ground so that cars can park underneath or building businesses with homes attached, like my own house with its small liquor shop built into the ground floor. Another example is the classic 4 1/2 tatami sized apartment that serves as standard living quarters for poor college students in Tokyo, which can be surprisingly livable thanks to well designed storage compartments and a fold-down loft area for sleeping. Another famous example of fitting a lot of people into a small space can be seen in Japan’s capsule hotels, honeycomb-like capsules that contain everything you need including TV, clock, and a plug to power your laptop, quite a bargain at around $30 a night even in the heart of Tokyo. Now a new company is experimenting with the capsule hotel concept, creating luxurious “First Class Capsules” that are more like very small hotel rooms, offering a place to stretch out in privacy while still keeping the cost low, around $48 per night.
A new company is experimenting with “first class” capsule hotels.
