Japanese company plans to create an “invisible” train

The Japanese company Seibu Railway, while continuing to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the company, plans to launch a new series of railway trains , which is scheduled to start in 2018. A distinctive feature of the new compositions will be their "invisibility" - they will have to merge with the surrounding landscape.

Designer Kazuyo Sejima [Kazuyo Sejima], who is working on a new train project , has not previously been involved in building trains - she’s actually an architect, the winner is Pritzker, which is often called the “Nobel Prize for Architects”. But the Japanese love their trains very much and constantly try to invent something unusual. Japanese high-speed and maglev trains traditionally set speed records. And now the Japanese have decided to outdo the whole and in appearance of the compositions.

Kazuyo Sejima decided that being in the train for passengers should be as comfortable as they feel in their own home - so that “the train becomes not a transport for passengers, but a place where they want to go.” She was also very interested in the opposite of the design tasks of a building, always standing in one place, and a train moving in space.
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The train follows a variety of landscapes, and the designer thought that it would be great to get him to blend in harmoniously with any of them. Due to the partially mirrored surface and the streamlined appearance, the train will have to “turn” into a part of its surroundings.

But the illustrations from the design competition of future trains , held in 2014, in which non-professionals specially participated:

























Seibu Railway Company, Ltd. - a large Japanese private railway operator and the central company of the Seibu Group, involved in public transport, real estate, retail and other industries. The company's lines connect the central part of the Japanese capital Tokyo with the cities of Saitama Prefecture. The company also owns an extensive network of bus routes and taxis.


The very first train of the Seibu 101 series from 1969