The slaves and the supercomputers

For a long time, we were taught that the Great Pyramid of Giza was built in just 20 years by a miserable army of slaves. Does anyone still believe this? Decades ago, the Obayashi Corporation conducted a serious simulation. Their conclusion? Even with modern technology and unlimited resources, it would take five years. For people 4,500 years ago to finish it in 20 years? The math simply doesn’t add up.

Pyramids are masterpieces of geometry, built with a level of accuracy that modern machines struggle to replicate. In my opinion, they were a super-long-term public project designed to provide stable employment and project national prestige—a massive, ancient version of an economic stimulus package.

Revisiting the endless mysteries surrounding the pyramids reminds me of a quote by the legendary Japanese artist Taro Okamoto. He once said, “It is important that art is not understood by anyone.” His point was that if something is not understood, it cannot be “evaluated.” And if it cannot be evaluated, its value cannot deteriorate with the passage of time. When you consider that both Okamoto’s Tower of the Sun and the Great Pyramids remain world-class tourist attractions, it seems that “being incomprehensible” is a vital strategy for long-term brand power. The most enduring icons are the ones we can never quite figure out.

The revelation of the lost civilization

However, there is a darker side to this mystery. The documentary The Revelation of the Pyramids suggests that these structures are not just tombs, but repositories of advanced knowledge—evidence of a super-advanced civilization wiped out by a global catastrophe.

It makes me realize how fragile human progress actually is. We assume history is a straight line going “up,” but the pyramids suggest it’s more like a series of peaks and valleys. The hardest thing for any civilization to do isn’t building a monument; it’s handing over the “how-to” to the next generation before the knowledge decays into myth.

The 20-Year reset: Japan’s living pyramid

If the pyramids represent the “Universality of Mystery,” then Japan’s Ise Grand Shrine represents the “Universality of Transmission.” This shrine has been torn down and rebuilt from scratch every 20 years for over a millennium. This isn’t because the wood is rotten; it’s a brilliant system for preserving traditional woodworking skills. By rebuilding it while the master craftsmen are still alive to teach the apprentices, we ensure that 2,000-year-old wisdom never becomes an “incomprehensible mystery” like the pyramids.

At CondeHouse, we are part of this living chain. Every chair we make is a small piece of that inherited “shrine” technology. We don’t just build furniture; we build a defense against the catastrophe of forgetting.

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Following Taro Okamoto’s logic, the Hatsune Miku Art Chair blends the “understood” tradition of woodworking with the “incomprehensible” energy of a digital icon. Much like rebuilding a shrine every 20 years, spending this much effort on a single chair is a mysterious choice—but we do it to ensure our skills never become lost relics of a forgotten civilization. Why not sit in a piece of furniture that defies easy evaluation, preserves ancient DNA, and remains eternally captivating? It’s not just a chair; it’s your own personal “Tower of the Sun” designed to survive the next catastrophe.

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