Short Section Through Alleyway_2 골목을 통해 짧은 섹션

Short Section Through Alleyway 골목을 통해 짧은 섹션

Flowing Streets 거리의 창조

Area of detail study

Flow Obstructions 흐름 장애물

Final Scene at Waters Edge

APT complex threshold with the Han River

Han River water level after the rainy season

Promenade in Plan 산책로의 계획

Site Model_1:500

Below are some images of a site model that I  made last week. I am determined to get in my suitcase when I return in two weeks. Partly in section the model shows the underground spaces for car parking. Massing exercises are to follow which hope to explore the physical notion of connecting through emulsifying.

Movement in X,Y and Z, a path...a promenade...

The maps below are quick studies into the character of the streets and paths that makeup the traditional low rise housing areas of Seoul. As a set they illustrate the informality and topography of these areas. It becomes clear when studying these layouts that the landscape and contours dictate. 

These drawings led me to explore the notion of a connecting path or promenade that follows and utilises the character of the landscape. The massive construction of the APT's create a terraced context with underground parking spaces and large retaining walls. As I have stated before these are my sites to test my strategy. I will upload images of the site in due course. I decided to draw the path in space and record the movement in three dimensions. This also led me to think about how the APT landscape can be used and experienced. The perspective view starts at 30m above the river on the footbridge on the road and falls through the complex, piercing apartment blocks on the way.

Movement in X,Y and Z have been represented in the sections and a plan. Little doors have been placed along the path that represent different thresholds. Yellow doors are where there is a transition from outside to inside. Grey doors, inside to outside and Black outside to underground.

Welcomm City Iroje Architects 시설계자 오신 것을 환영합니다

Paju Book City with Florian Beigel and Philip Christou

The above images are from a dossier produced last weekend which documents ARU's work at Paju Book City, Seoul. The precedent study looks to compile drawings and photos that explain the main design concepts and materiality. It is city devoted to books, publishers and printers and is an architectural wonderland. The study is comprised of three sections, firstly a study that looks at the masterplan idea of an urban wetland. Florian and Phil describe their strategy as landscape infrastructure. Secondly a study into three of ARU's different construction envelopes and thirdly a 1:1 study of the materiality and detail of the three buildings. I spent much time exploring their second completed project for Positive Thinking publishers. The traditional Korean brick is talks of many stories as they are handmade and have the makers fingerprints on them. I liked the idea that this construction could be drawn as a curtain and I explored a method of representing the non load-bearing quality of this rain-screen facade.  

Water Infrastructures 워터 인프라

Water flows through the city, pipes pierce the ground and buildings and supply the citizens needs. The map studies the differing infrastructures that collect, store and transport water. At street level this movement is recorded and metered via small devices attached to the exterior of buildings. This is another key characteristic of the traditional fabric and one that the Apatu complexes lack. 

Cityscape to Possible Sitescape

Heukseok An Abrupt Dislocation 돌발 전위를 흑석

Looking to test a strategy, I felt I needed a location to test it in. This led me back to the River Han. Seoul has over the last decade reconnected physically and psychologically with the Waters edge. There are still places where a dislocation occurs. I will concentrate on an area called Heukseok which is located on the southern bank of the Han. A number of layers disconnect the city communities from the waters edge.
A figure ground plan helps illustrate these different layers. Modern Apatu complexes and six lanes of traffic visually and physically disconnect the traditional housing area from the rivers edge. A section will clearly show the apartment complexes as a series of disconnecting walls. My strategy will be to blur the boundaries between these obstructive layers.

Beaches+Cities+Dislocations 해변 + 도시 + 전위

The time has come for me to distill my research allowing a clear strategic direction to emerge. I have discovered the Jimjilbang, which are to me purifying spaces embeded in the culture and urban fabric of Seoul. What I am currently concentrating on  in preparation for my gift project is a strategy of looking for physical dislocations within the city. 


The Cheonggycheon stream project is an example where the city has rediscovered a natural, historical enitity deep within the city centre. This infrastructural beach provides connections between pure and unpure parts of the city. Similary the Han was cruelly disconnected from the city and I will return to the Park to search out a site that illustrates an abrupt dislocation. Butlin's has long been an isolated 'city' within the town, a self contained community. Permeating Butlins' hard barrier will create a connection with the town. The potential of the southern boundary shared with the promenade has been neglected by the resort. Its metal spiked fence implies a negative relationship with the beach and the town. An interesting way of dealing with Butlins' dislocation could be to treat it as a city.

Photomontage of the Cheonggycheon Stream project. The urban dislocation is now a memory.

Seoul has reconnected with its Rivers through physical connections such as bridges, lifts and tunnels. The park is the length of the river, which in turn becomes the length of the city. The same spatial relationship happens in Bognor where the promenade is a public space the length of the town.  My goal is to discover a dislocated site that informs a method of reforming a connection. Possible strategies may become paths, physical interventions or the framing of views. In Bognor my strategy is to reveal the beach to the town, a method of enacting a flow that blends the two extremes.

Seoul Solid Crew Swap Shop

All seven of the Seoul Solid Crew spent last Sunday busy envisaging and exploring the essence of other peoples projects, through physical model making. The exercise was extremely useful as it allowed me to formulate strategic ideas that dealt with dislocations and reconnections. I have realised that this approach will be extremely applicable when looking at Bognor and more specifically Butlin's. So first up is Tommy Downs' model... 

This model demonstrates that any surface can be a place of escape. Turn Butlins inside out. by punching through the walls separating inside and outside we can create a muddying of the water, or more accurately, a watering of the mud - an emulsion can be formed.


Blending and muddying of the water opened up an avenue of thinking that I was blind to before. The model represents a three dimensional strategy of dealing with reconnections. Second up is Alpa Depanis' model...

The title of your thesis and the overall ambition to reconnect with the sea in bognor set up a spectrum that mediates between pure and unpure. By your definitions, the sea itself marks one end of the scale - the purest condition. This is a natural condition that lacks a hard edge presently there is abrupt disconnection where the body of water meets the town.  The town comprises a formal condition and is the site of the other extreme of the spectrum - the unpure.  in order to counter the severe division, the model proposes the insertion of pure spaces within the unpure density. these spaces begin to form a network that enable flow between the extremes and restore a sense of balance.


After much discussion it was clear that the Jimjil spaces represented the purest spaces within the unpure density of the city. This clarified my thinking and has allowed me to move forward and discover a site to test a strategy.

The Pleasure Beach 기쁨 비치

The second 'beach' like area of Seoul, after the Han River is Wolmido, a pleasure beach. A liberating place unfound in central Seoul, offering cheap tacky fun. The promenade resembles a prison like space, where street furniture clutters and restricts views out to the sea. A ride on the monorail would offer a better elevated vantage point, but what about the pedestrian?

In high season the small island is over run with people and cars, the second image looks to visualise this automobile bombardment.

Undressing the Jimjilbang 목욕탕 옷을 벗기는

From my memory I have redrawn the spatial layouts of the Jimjilbang's that I've visited so far. These drawings should be developed to include material and atmospheric qualities. They are certainly missing some naked Korean men. As a follow up to redrawing the wet spaces contained within the Jimjilbang I drew the sections that correspond to many of the spaces illustrated in the plans. By overlaying the drawing on the cityscape I'm trying to show the embedded nature of these contained spaces in the city's urban fabric. The Photograph represents the incredible opportunity that a view could offer, a connection to the city and the provision of a reference point for contemplation. 

Escape to Wolmido, a Pleasure Destination

Seoul & The Sea

This drawing looks at Seoul's urban growth towards the Yellow Sea to the West of the city. The seaport of Incheon is the nearest city to Seoul and has a population of 2.7 million making it South Koreas third largest metropolis. The transport connections between the two cities make the travel time between the two centres not much more than an hour. Our location is flagged in red which represents the KNUA campus.

Fabric of Seoul 서울의 구조

Seoul has transformed into a mega city the last sixty years. The density of the city and how its growth vertically can be seen when comparing the same view. The images below are part of an exhibition at the Museum of Seoul, the top photo was taken 1949 and second looking at the same view in 2007.

The museum also offered a chance to study the city at a scale of 1:500 on a giant model roughly 100sqm in size. It illustrated the cities new development and the ambition to turn the US military base in Itaewon into a large green lung in the centre of the city. Climbing the Namsan, a mountain in the centre of the city, the topography of the area becomes apparent. The mountains contain the city in all directions. I took a series of photos that looked at the differing densities of the city, the prevalence of the apatu apartment blocks have steadily erased the low rise more adhoc suburbs.