Born in 1924, Sachio Otani graduated from the University of Tokyo and worked throughout the 1950s in the studio of Kenzo Tange, contributing to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (1955). Otani established his own practice in 1960 and published his influential Kojimachi cluster housing concept in 1961. In 1963 he won the design competition for the Kyoto International Conference Centre (1965) - a megastructural complex of concrete trapezoids considered a key built example of the Metabolist philosophy. Otani’s design for the Sumitomo Pavilion at Expo 70 was a different expression of that movement, with 9 ‘flying saucer’ domes suspended on a forest of steel columns. Across his long career, Otani taught throughout Japan and continued to produce multifaceted and complex designs for large-scale public buildings.

Robin Boyd profiled Otani in New Directions in Japanese Architecture. When recommending architectural highlights for a trip to Japan by his friend and business partner Frederick Romberg, Boyd slyly highlighted the Kyoto International Conference Centre as “Typical of best and most dubious of New Japan Architecture.”