Architecture News

The architecture connects the identity of a place and projects it into the future. The new presence summarizes the values of a culture that considers carefully its gestures. Building today in the metropolitan city of Seoul gives us the opportunity to restore the built volumes to a human scale and interpret the spirit of a culture. An empty urban block is inhabited, pressed between the strict and incumbent city volumes: it becomes a fossilized tree that seems to breathe in the interstices of its geometrical fringe and expands the limited spaces of the city.

Living in an era of great changes today, people experienced life from poverty to affluence, but the subjective well-being has not been promoted correspondingly. On the contrary, modern people become more restless and uneasy, which is due to the lack of calmness in the heart; and this calmness can be gained only after hustle and bustle fades away. Only when the material is reduced to the essence can it lead to its spiritual level, which is the goal of this project.

This narrow, one-bedroom terrace in the heart of Fitzroy, Melbourne sits on a compact 79m2 site. The original cottage was dark, cold and cramped with a raking ladder in the middle of the already small living space accessing its single, mezzanine bedroom. The brief was to create a functional two-bedroom home on a modest budget. Spatial constraints, light and views drove the design response.

The residence is located at the end of a cul-de-sac on a promontory elevated above legendary Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. It was originally built in 1961 and the renovation and addition were to reflect the mid-century style architecture of that time.