condenCITY_60 public discourse

The year (and decade) ended with two public exhibitions of intensions well beyond personal and group recognition. The intense need to bring architecture to the forefront of social/ political awareness and debate was impetus enough for our semester long investigation and final exhibitions. 'Transit_ house', considering the plight of North Korean refugees and the  need for  an accessible housing type, in the very least was an attempt to plant seeds for dialogue and contemplation. Although met with modest reception the ideas will extend beyond studio and gallery. 

Structures of Propaganda

Tis the season for propaganda. 

A large Christmas tree has been fashioned of lights, wrapping a communications tower bordering the DMZ in South Korea. The tower, standing 30 meters high, is supposedly viewable by villagers and military posts on the north side of the DMZ border.  It has been reported the 'tree'  alters perceptions of North Korean residents to recognize fallacies of the North Korean government, who for years have been telling its citizens that they are far better off than the people of South Korea. The bright light display of the tree is meant to challenge this idea amidst long periods of blackout and limited electricity availability in the North...so the story in the media goes or is it a Christian church thing? It certainly wouldn't be the first time for such propaganda.

Transit_ house Seoul

Opening tomorrow, the 20th of December at Prugio Valley gallery in Gangnam ]Seoul[ is an exhibition of ideas for housing Seoul's next wave of refugees from North Korea. This semester our design studio has been researching the plighted situation of North Korean's seeking freedoms here in the south. Our group will be exhibiting ideas for new housing types and strategies, surprisingly a muted topic amongst design professionals in South Korea.

The exhibition will run through the 24th of December. 

condenCITY_59 inhabiting the gap

Seongbuk-gu in Seoul extends outside the northern most ancient city walls. It is an amalgamation of old and new with preservation and conversion of 1930's urban Hanok's (traditional Korean houses) alongside new villas and non-descipt commercial storefronts that can be found throughout Seoul. Galleries, museums and creatively inspired businesses dot the cityscape here. 

As in many of Seoul's older districts there is a willingness to inhabit the uninhabitable- or so it would seem. Drainage-way turned neighborhood with residences and small cafes filling what appears to be a once natural water way. Recent summer and early fall monsoons brought drenching deluges to the region this year and one must wonder the ability of such unplanned areas to withstand the tendencies of water to flow to the lowest geographical point. Somehow drainage whether sufficient or not  has been mitigated allowing the occupation of this urban gap.

   

condenCITY_58 lines and curves

Rational expressions and organizations, at least in a coherent sense,  as experienced momentarily in Seoul. New commerce rises out of formless city streets. Lines (and the occasional curve) replace the non linear city. While Gangnam can hardly be considered historic by any stretch of the imagination, its roots and side streets retain characteristics of Seoul's urban past. With each new high-rise tower these woven traits of unplanned urbanity slip away. 

Seoul has become linear. 

condenCITY_57 seoul adaptations 1.2

mobile garments_ Seocho-dong 


......[or anywhere]

condenCITY_56 city of refugee

Seoul has been a city of refugee for decades. It's massive growth through the mid-twentieth century was fueled by rural migrations and immigration from abroad. People seeking new opportunity and promotion flocked to the city. Today, Seoul faces a new population of refugees hoping to find political, idealogical and economic freedoms. Ironically, this marginalized population of defecting North Koreans, is given relatively little assistance when faced with issues of housing equality and option. 

This semester, graduate students at Konkuk University will be researching and designing 'transitional' refugee housing for North Korean defectors, to be sited in a quickly changing district within Seoul city boundaries.  A silenced topic (one rarely discussed amongst local design professionals and government collaboration) will be placed at the forefront of discourse with an end of the semester exhibition  of works to be held at Prugio Gallery in Seoul.

  

condenCITY_55 above

Daum.net aerial view of Ttueksom station in Seoul

Dymaxion Map, Buckminster Fuller, Courtesy wikimedia commons

Now, more than ever, we have access to a myriad of options for viewing the city. Cartography, or the craft of map-making has for centuries been a search for representing the earths surface and its composition in two dimensional form. Maps as two dimensional representations have given way to digitized volumes of aerial shots and three dimensionally charted land/ building forms, capturing nearly every corner of our urban (and rural) environments. It seems impossible that the two dimensional map, be it analogue or digital, will disappear anytime soon. The ability to view the city or any arrangement on the earths surface from various vantage points in nearly live time, has been augmented with combined technologies for unprecedented realism in viewing the composition of the earths surface from above.    

By comparison, the Dymaxion map, patented by Buckminster Fuller in 1946, was a projection of a world map onto the surface of a polyhedron. The ensuing pattern was then unfolded using various methods and flattened to form a two-dimensional map which, in the end retained much of the proportional integrity of the globe map. While it may seem easy to dismiss the accuracy of the Dymaxion map at first glance, when in fact it is the deception of our minds eye that challenges relationships of the continents we have come to recognize in a northerly upward orientation, form and arrangement. The polyhedron superimposed grid establishing accurate break points, while maintaining continental precision. 

So too, is the current aerial deceptive in its momentary, time captured snapshot of the city. Here today, and as is the case in Seoul, altered city tomorrow. Perhaps in the near future technology will have bridged the gap between transforming cities/ land forms and the digitized lenses through which we view them. 

  

condenCITY_54 urban gaps

The city of Seoul is always in-between, both physically and metaphysically. The gaps and fissures that feed our imagination are voids for intervention. They expose the tattered form of transformation caught between yesterday, today and tomorrow. Time is presented as exposed fragments; weathered and aged, testament to the labored roots of a cities humble beginning. 

Early autumn brilliant blue breaks the hazy grey of thick summer. With mid-summer weight lifted the urban gap is once again free to breath.

condenCITY_53 seoul adaptations 1.1

His divided life, halved by structures before him that cast dark midday shadows. The other side of the road a world apart. He catch glimpses of through sluggish, unending traffic and towering concrete columns to another world. This industrial city, where workers ceaselessly tire from sun up till evening, the air tinged thick with the smells of determined labor. On a bright summers day it stifles the senses. This is the workers city, built on hand and foot with stern faces. 

My life on the same metro-line, a minutes journey away and yet a social-political world apart. My train glides past above looking down at the city floor below. Speculations and ruminating on an adaptable city. 

Cal Berkeley Architecture: The First 100 Years

There was a time from 1999 to 2003 when Wurster Hall was mostly closed for seismic renovations. I say mostly because a few rooms on the lower non-studio corridors remained open for classes. I was at Berkeley during this strange transitional time. Reflecting back, it seemed disappointing then to have not been a part of Wurster's long history but our class and the others around ours had a history of its own perhaps part of the uniqueness of a Berkeley education (and the departments relatively long history in American Architecture education). 

A recent article and good read at the Architects Newspaper highlights the last 100 years of the College of Architecture at UC Berkeley. With fondness those of us remembering the voices and spaces that shaped our formative years- and still forming to this day.

condenCITY_52 tattered edges

Gwangju in the far south on the Korean peninsula is a city seeking identity. In recent years its outwardly expansive growth has sought to create a new urban center for business, residence as well as renewed image for the city in general. This growth to the western urban edge has now joined efforts with the Korean governments recent campaign to redevelop the four major rivers throughout the country. Political argument has it that redeveloping the river corridors will attract tourism and protect urban areas from flooding. Read more on the history of the projects here at the Joongang Daily. 

Whats most shocking is the processional erasure of natural habitat presently being bulldozed in the name of 'restoration'. Design and development needs to have its limits (if this can even be classified as design). The river corridors are home and habitat to migratory Egrets and various other species now threatened by habitat destruction. The natural 'design' of such places should remain just that. No amount of beautification can claim progress over what nature can accomplish rightly on its own; and the projects are just that unsightly beautification.

Un-condensed rural 1.0

I'm not going to use the words 'green' or 'sustainable'. Truly we have always know of these ideas, lived them to a larger extent (in many cultures around the world) without the commercialized use of these terms, without the "greening" of anything. So how have we forgotten about these basics of life? How have we forgotten what it means to be a part of our environment so seamlessly? These are fundamental questions that seem easily exposed when visiting places inherently part of a larger system. 

I recently revisited a historic garden in the far south on the Korean peninsula. Maintained for over five hundred years, Soswaewon has passed through successive generations as a place of seclusion, meditation and scholarly discourse. It has passed through the hands of political outcasts, scholars, invading governments (Japan) and was subsequently rebuilt after Colonial destruction.  In Korea, it is one of the most recognized historical places of its kind and continues to represent uncompromising points of view regarding 'constructing' in the context of nature. Balance has been established through relationships. 

Soswaewon is composed of a meandering wall which, encloses the garden on all sides except to the southeast where the site is bound by a small creek. The wall shifts from edge boundary to internal divisor and in doing so separates a small structure (a residence of the host) situated at the highest elevation in the garden. An even smaller residence for a guest placed at the lowest elevation just below the hosts house.  At the middle of the garden the wall encloses a small outdoor space of meditation, or what one can assume was the past function of this 'outdoor room'. The wall continues to transform over the restricted distance of the valleys shifting topography, giving way to altered functions. The wall rises and falls, responding to both nature and human necessity.  Its function oscillating between boundary and permeability, being seen and being invisible, exposing and concealing. The expression of which is a clear reflection of a balanced existence. 

condenCITY_51 lost city

 Namdaemoon destruction and reconstruction: images courtesy Chosun Ilbo

Just over two years ago an arsonist set fire to Sungnyemun on Feb. 11, 2008. Korea's No. 1 national treasure was burned with almost 70% (as reported in the news) total destructive damage to original wood structure with the entire second level of the ancient city gate known as Namdaemun being destroyed. Sungnyemun was originally constructed in 1396. The reconstructive efforts have exposed newly unearthed original foundation stones dating back to the early period of the Joseon Dynasty.

The newly discovered foundations have also revealed discrepancies in what was thought to be the original elevation of the old city gate. Excavation experts have noted that the current ground level around the historic structure is approximately 1.4 meters higher than the orginal ground elevation, obscuring the original foundation stones. As reported researches will now document the gates height at 8 meters obove sea level.

 

condenCITY_50 seoul adaptations 1.0

 Jong-gak 2002

 I took this photo in the winter of 2002 while living in Seoul. While so much has changed here, so much hasn't. In 2002, this perspective of commercial Seoul represented to me all that was different here regarding the urban condition; so much so it is still at the forethought of my interest in Seoul as a place of urban adaptations. Buildings and commercial structures are 'soft surfaces' (and for the most part irrelevant in design) readily manipulated, covered and altered. The base surface rendered obsolete, unnecessary beyond that of supporting facade and malleable interior space.

Nearly eight years later, a visit to this part of the city reveals the same invisible buildings and structures with new faces. Much that was there in 2002 has given way to remodel storefronts, new tenants or other altered cosmetic change (inevitable in commercially economies). The collective transformation of such districts changes our overall perception of the  city; our memories of the past clouded with surface adaptations.

Seoul formless_2.3

Namdaemoon 1904

Many discussions were held this semester about the historic 'plan' of Seoul. Perhaps more succinctly was the lack there of. Seoul's earliest beginnings excluded any semblance of urban planning. The urban form which emerged at the turn of the 20th century was the result of land ownership and negotiated, sometimes indistinctly blurred boundaries. 

Seoul could be described as a city in reverse. Its roads and thorough fares, by-products of an indigenous architecture and building 'mass'. Viewed another way, the city streets and routes came second. Cities, as we known them in many other places (as in western cities), are often the direct result of planned efforts forged of transportation routes and zoned districts.

Seoul, it seems is exactly opposite.

condenCITY_49 long city 2.0

The final days of each semester seem to expose more questions than answers but perhaps this should be the goal of any studio objective; establishing questions which then become seeds of interest for lifelong journey's and investigations. This semester my students have been challenging Seoul's decision to demolish Saewoon Sanga and replace the 40 year old structure with park space. (See thoughts on Saewoon from previous words condenCITY_42.)

The contention that this mega-structure is a vital part of the cities rapid transformation (although recent history has rendered the building obsolete) and in part can become a continuation of Seoul's history and future. Student projects considered urban as well as architectural issues at divergent (and relevant) scales. Project proposals instigated ideas for temporary and in themselves transformable solutions, recognizing the ever evolving nature of Seoul and the emerging questions 'how do we respond to the these rapid changes' and 'how can we consider existing structure as relevant and adaptable as opposed to expendable' (which is often the case here in Seoul). 

The above works were completed by Hanyang University students Eun Hee Lee, Jong Hyun Kim and Hyun Kim from top to bottom respectively. 

   

condenCITY_48 Vertical life 2.0

The apartment phenomenon and proliferation has transformed the face of Seoul. There is no other building type that has so drastically shaped the image and form of Seoul. Its current (yet loosely defined) life cycle stands at around 35 years after which entire complexes and numerous apartment units fall to the demolition crane. The first generation of such apartment complexes in Seoul's southern urban districts have already begun to be redeveloped, with aging buildings being replaced with higher density developments. 

Banpo Dong's apartment explosion began in the 1970's. Lining the Han River on the south side of the city, thousands of apartments of this residential district await 'ugrades' with apartment dwellers sometimes divided about being displaced, often with economic incentives spearheading disputes and holdouts (there has to be unanimous agreement amongst current dwellers prior to any redevelopment). The Shin Banpo is one such complex at the twilight of its lifespan. 

Apartment blocks in Seoul are places of homogeniety. Individuality is camouflaged amongst drab concrete slabs dressed in standard neutral beige. The apartment phenomenon has been the center of cultural debate as such residential conditions seem to skirt the very traditions of social contact and place identity here in Korea. Conditions that seem long lost in Seoul's quest to house exploding urban populations of the past forty years. While measures to improve such developments in recent times have been to improve housing design and livable conditions, ironically (as in most sub-urban residential developments anywhere in the world) implemented codes and zoning instill a cycle of stifled potential in advancing such residential models. The results are often more of the same as prescribed by written laws.

condenCITY_47 urban dinosaur

The Seoul Express Bus Terminal in Gangnam opened in 1985. City plans have already tagged the building for removal and reconstruction within the next ten years. Like most construction in Seoul, its hulking mass of weighted concrete is oppressive and awkward at best. A walk around the dated structure seems more like 1960 as opposed to something of a 1980's creation. Oddly though, its oddity is precisely it's appeal. 

Entering on either the east or west sides of the building takes you through oversized arcades ( the most interesting spatial experiences at the terminal ) situated at the buildings edges and defined by massive concrete columns extending to foundation.  The spaces are well kept and appear in a continual state of mopped-over preservation, presumably as they have for the past twenty five years.  


Even when open the terminal appears closed. Passengers are funneled down the long flanking sides of the building to entries well concealed and curiously hidden from street view. It was months after living here I realized the terminal was in operation.  Its fortified appearance imposes an impenetrable impression, standing as apparition within the bustle of the busiest bus and subway depot in the city.

condenCITY_46 relative cities : irrelevant form

 image courtesy wiki commons

The 193 km (120 miles) that separate Seoul, South Korea and Pyongyang, North Korea couldn't seem greater if the two cities were actually opposite poles of the planet. With some effort it is possible for foreigners to visit Pyongyang but for now, I am stuck with imagining what the city must like. A unified Korea and seamless visit to Pyongyang seems equally impossible anytime in the foreseeable future. I am left to my imaginative devices but from what I have read and the photos I have seen, there are remarkable similarities between the architectural 'technique' in cities of the north and cities here in the south. Korean architecture is intensely 'form' driven. Seoul is testament to that. The culmination of such projections perhaps is even more evident in the Ryugyong Hotel located in the North Korean capital.

The Ryugyong Hotel construction began in 1987 but was abruptly halted in 1992 amidst the North's  severe economic troubles. The construction of the mega-structure has remained on hold since 1992 however, recent investment has renewed efforts to complete the out-of-place building.  After nearly 16 years, in early 2008, foreign investors and political motivation allowed construction to restart.  The structural skeleton of Ryugyong stands at 105 floors and was initially built to attract foreign investors, dignitaries and guests who would stay in anyone of the staggering 3000 hotel rooms. There have been questions about construction quality and even structural integrity of the building with claims the elevator shafts are misaligned, yet its looming completion pushes on.

The construction now has been projected to be complete by 2012, coinciding with government celebrations marking the 100 year anniversary of the late communist leader (the father of Kim Jong Il). With populations of starving citizens one has to question the motivation of a government to put perverse architectural form ahead of dying social need. Since when have cities been places of equality though? Speculation is, the work now being done is nothing more than an aesthetic 'skin', covering what will remain an empty, non functional building.

condenCITY_45 transitions

May 

transitions

hard line

between winter chill

summer heat

caught between light 

and rising steam 

public dimensions

drift in and out

of negotiated

boundary

Seoul Formless_adaptations

Architecture just happens. 

It is the adaptable forms of the city which shape the everyday pedestrian experience in Seoul. Makeshift structures identify as utilitarian only and yet account for much of the cities outward aesthetic. Such small buildings represent Seoul's "commando" approach to urban development (which through the 20th century drove Seoul's quick modernization), whereby necessity and function have clouded any consideration of 'planned'.  

Seoul is evolutionary.

condencity_44 double city

Seoul's double identity is both hidden and exposed simultaneously. Underground corridors extend invisibly (from the city streets above) for blocks, connecting subway riders from sidewalk destinations to subway trains below ground. Lengthy tunnels match length for length sidewalks and streets at ground level. Curiously, few corridors as this are so sparsely populated leaving destination above in questionable limbo until the moment of arrival when emerging into city light.

condencity_43 urban memory

The highest topographical elevation on the Konkuk University campus in Seoul is punctuated with an oddly curious building, projecting an aesthetic and form caught somewhere between Corbusian modern and Eastern Block socialist architecture of the 1960's. The designing Korean architect in fact had studied briefly under Le Corbusier and was undoubtedly influenced in the outcome of what stands today. The building functions now as the campus' foreign language institute but in the recent past served as the school's main library. 

It's exterior white-washed walls have recorded seasonal time with weathered streaks and accumulated dust. The interior, while dated opposite outside, has recently undergone a fresh coat of refurbishment. Painted corridors and newly tiled floors attempt to conceal time. As I moved around the central, spiraling corridor I can't help but remember the long extended corridors of the communist panel-laks of Eastern Europe. Clouded windows, with the collected haze of season's and lives past to my right, mysteriously concealed, oblique spaces to my left; urban memory and the making of myths. 

Condencity_42 long city

Saewoon Sanga during the 1970's

The birth of modern architecture in Seoul was in part initiated by the construction of Saewoon Sanga in the mid 1960s. It's construction erased a half century of contentious urban 'vacancy' and representation. In the early 20th century a 1km strip of land was cleared by Japanese Colonial occupation and served as a fire break in the city during war time. After the Korean War, new urban settlers quickly constructed shanty villages and the area became known as the cities red light district. Rapid post war reconstruction of Seoul and a growing economy, fueled a burgeoning electronics industry and instigated needs for a larger modern market place. 

The vision for Saewoon Sanga by renowned Korean architect Kim Swoo Geun and city officials was thus an unprecedented mega-mixed use project of electronics commerce, educational and residential spaces, stretching the entire 1km. The ambitions of the project, while never fully materializing in diversity of mixed-use functions, did become the cities largest electronics market and most desirable residential address. Home to movie stars and corporate CEO's it's vibrant climax was quickly overcome by subsequent residential and electronics markets in other parts of Seoul. What has become today is a marginalized market of working class dwellers struggling to survive amidst a city that has quickly surpassed (and left behind) the advancements of what Saewoon Sanga once represented. 

Today, the mega-structure stands silently the same as it has for the past 45 years. Virtually unchanged and in disrepair its fate to demolition cranes apparently decided by the city of Seoul. This stretch of concrete form will once again become 'empty' as in urban park, dispersing its commercial tenants and residents of decades to other hidden corners of the city. It appears an un-thoughtfully simple solution for such a complex and fascinating place, to completely demolish the birth place of 'modern' in Seoul.

Condencity_41 dead ends

Night and day are reversed in the dead-end corners of Seoul. The sky exists as a night like grey metal cover with cool fluorescent eye-burning light. Just above, the day shines bright without notice. Narrow alleys pinch to shoulder width and terminate in shuttered doors. Boundaries of public and private space blur in obscurity and the chance to move forward is met with hesitation. Seoul's pulse are back alleys of work and mystery. 

Their presence, while here today appears to be something bordering the obsolete. As modernization of this city continues such curious roads are being raised and replaced with sterile glass towers. This road too has a finite future. In one form or another it will persist in our memories and imagination.

Seoul formless 2.2

Recently I have begun writing and researching about urban 'adaptations'. The economic machine of Seoul on a micro scale is evidence enough of how adaptable the generic office 'box' can be. With little regard for form or context the commercial shop adapts to any building location. Small spaces at the street front regularly appear and dissappear with the ebb and flo of economics. In return the street and city at large are constantly changed at face value.  Color, material and light exist apart from the building in which they are fashioned to.

Condencity_40 slim

San Francisco is attractively slim. It's the narrow lots wedged into city gaps and my memory that make it un-American; slim. Zero lot lines squeeze in to a nearly 'zero lot'. City often surprises us most when it reveals the least. An efficient use of space leaves much to the imagination. Stairs, Elevator, could it all be there?  The memory of yesterday simply exists for what is possible today. 

Condencity_39 Beige

Returning to the scene of the crime, I recently made a brief appearance in San Francisco. From a new perspective at the 17th floor the city is not what I remember. I remember a 4th floor lifestyle from my apartment and office. Rarely did I go outside of that vantage point of the city.  17 was new for me and a reminder of how 'beige' San Francisco is. Cast against a cloud strewn blue sky and the occasional colored tower, the city exists banal in a colorless resistance. Variable identity is manifest only through ornament and time dependent details.


Beige gives way sirens and horns from below that remind me of a return home. San Francisco, frozen in its time remains as it always has. 

Seoul Formless_2.1

With each step we experience the rise and fall of Seoul's urban topography. The city is shaped by contours, viewed  through pedestrian spaces of yesterday and today. Links between here and there are captured in laborious step and breath. With few exceptions the architecture and buildings that dress these slopes do so in clustered masses of indeterminate form; hillsides are blanketed with irregularity and density.

The city is experienced in actions. Carefully aware of the irregular rise from step to step, one is reminded of natures imperfections and the city as a place of formless possibility to mirror that of nature. 

Seoul Formless_2

Image reference SDI, 1961

Topography is at the heart of Korean consciousness and life. In a country more than 70% mountainous it is the lay of land that is a constant force against building, dwelling and urban form. In the recent past as seen in the image above from 1961, illegal villages and districts of Seoul were constructed in less than desirable locations, often to avoid inspection and notice from city officials. The results of which were meandering clusters on steep terrain, isolated and removed from the cities center.

Many such places have long disappeared but remain as documented reminders of how city and land form combine. Improvisation and necessity intertwined, rendering the city formless.

Seoul Formless

Old and new collide in Seoul's layered core. Service industry and corporate interests shape the cities inner block structure where makeshift buildings and office towers stand side by side in contrasting function. The result is formless whereby urban organization dissolves in fragments. Order and structure give way to dissorder and a patchwork of  yesterday and today.

The cities evolution couldn't be more clear in intersections such as these. At once time appears frozen in reflections of foundational industry and how these places established Seoul as a major urban center. The city around such places continues to evolve quickly in speculative transformations. The combination of these two conditions creates a complex and formless identity.