Shizen (自然) Is the Japanese Lesson in Choosing Materials

When choreographing the materials that make up your home, be it through the decor you’ve meticulously curated or the architecture playing backdrop, how considered are your final choices? The Japanese concept of shizen begs this very question.

It’s a lesser-known aspect of Japanese design that I’d argue rounds up to be one of the more important decisions you could make for your home. And in this age of fleeting aesthetics, it sets a real, lasting foundation for your living spaces.

So, I spoke to a Japanese interior designer for authentic advice on what shizen entails and how to bring it into your residence.

What Is Shizen?

A bedroom with a wood headboard, a tatami mat, a floor mattress, a paper lamp, and a vase of flowers

Note the wood from the headboard, the rice grass from the tatami, the plaster from the vase, and the paper courtesy of the lamp layering into each other.

(Image credit: Yoko Kloeden Design)

“Shizen (自然) is usually translated as nature, and in design writing it tends to get flattened into ‘the natural look’,” says interior designer Yoko Kloeden. “The closest I can manage in English is naturalness without pretence — a quality of being what you are, without arrangement.”

To which, she explains that the opposite of shizen is not exactly synthetic. “It is contrived,” Yoko clarifies. “A room can be full of oak and stone and still fail the test, if the materials are there to perform naturalness rather than to do a job. The tea house is the reference point. Japanese decor in the form of tatami, washi paper, bamboo, all chosen for humility rather than effect.”

Yoko Kloeden

Yoko Kloeden Design is a London-based architecture and interior design studio, founded by Yoko Kloeden in 2016. Located in West London, the studio specializes in crafting mood-enhancing sanctuaries, seamlessly blending Japanese aesthetics with natural, serene elements. Each project aims to create spaces that feel both harmonious and deeply restorative, reflecting Yoko’s commitment to calm, balanced interiors. The studio provides a full range of architecture and interior design services for private and commercial clients, carefully crafting every space to bring balance, beauty, and well-being to those who inhabit it.

H&M

Light Beige Rice Paper Table Lamp

Why Do Materials That Tell a Story Matter?

A living room with a large paper lamp pendant, a stone fireplace, a vase of stems, ceramic bowls, a patterned rug, coffee table books, and a wood chair — Choosing the right materials builds character and ultimately contributes to a home that feels comfortably livable.

“To put it simply, shizen matters because real materials mature and imitations wear out. That is the whole distinction, and it is easy to miss, because a good laminate looks convincing in a showroom. And this is part of the problem,” she notes.

“Every material is photographed at the one moment it will never look like again — the day it was installed. Nobody markets year three. This produces a contradiction I meet in almost every project. Clients tell me they want a home connected to nature, with natural materials, something that feels alive.

“In the same conversation, they describe wanting every surface to look on the last day exactly as it did on the first. Both wishes are genuine, and they cannot both be met, because a natural material that does not change is a contradiction in terms.”

Yoko tells me there’s evidence beneath the romance. “Studies in environmental psychology find that natural materials lower cortisol and steady the heart rate, even in laboratory conditions. Our nervous systems recognize them, and that response is not available from something manufactured to resemble them.”

And increasingly, people are prioritizing home wellness through concepts like biophilic design and eco-conscious choices in sustainable materials, too.

FRAMA

Bracket Ash Wood Dining Chair

What Are the Best Materials?

A wooden screen, a staircase, and a switchboard in a white room — It’s not about choosing natural materials in every case, but prioritizing earthen options where your body connects with the home.

“I do not put natural materials everywhere,” Yoko reveals. “I put them where you touch, rest and gather — where the body actually meets the building. Worktops, floors, handrails, the arm of a chair, a bath’s surroundings. Elsewhere, a well-chosen painted finish is often the more honest answer.”

She mentions that intentionally choosing materials that tell a story is another admirable approach to shizen. “Think oak turned from a fallen tree. Ceramics made from clay dug on a beach. Hand-glazed zellige tiles where no two are quite the same color,” she suggests, and I can’t help but wonder if the DIY revival will bring about more honest, personal styling in contemporary homes.

“In one house we sanded back the original floorboards and clad a wall in bricks of the same period — the story was already in the building. In another, the objects came with the clients from France and West Africa. None of this is more expensive in any meaningful sense. They simply carry information — where they came from, whose hands shaped them — and a home assembled from objects with histories feels different to live in than one assembled from products.”

Kaneko Kohyo

Rinka Ceramic Oval Dinner Plates, Set of 4

NOBI-TSUTSU

Paper Vase No. 1

Antique Shop JUNNA

Japanese Linen Noren Curtain

Another integral aspect of Japanese design includes the use of light. The art of komorebi will bring your home alive through crafty consideration of natural sunshine.