The Paper Art Museum comprises two buildings and is situated in Mishima, the capital of the Japanese prefecture of Shizuoka, south-west of Tokyo. As one of the largest paper manufacturers in the country, the client wished to open his private collection to the public and inform them about this ancient Japanese craft. The collection is housed in the three-storey museum tract. There is also a single-storey gallery where temporary exhibitions on modern paper art are presented. Visitors have access to the complex via a small glazed entrance hall. Both tracts consist of a steel-frame structure enclosed within a skin of translucent glass-fibre-reinforced panels, which are used in different forms. In the end faces, to the west and east, the panels are incorporated in up-and-over gates that open to a height of nearly 10m. On the south side, segments of the facade can be pivoted out on each floor to an angle of 90°. These “shitomido” elements, as they are known in traditional Japanese architecture, serve here to provide sunshading.