Condition of Seoul Architecture

Seoul is just behind Mumbai and Lagos in the list of the most extreme density cities in the world. From a population of 3.5 million in 1965, the city exceeded 25 million in 2019, hosting 50% of the population in an area as large as 12% of South Korea. The central areas have seen the cost of land rising by 680 times since the Korean War, reaching the prohibitive $80,000 per square meter.

This extreme situation in which architects must operate, design, and build, creates the theoretical basis of “The Condition of Seoul Architecture”. The research insists on the point of view of 18 of the most innovative South Korean architects, showing their projects and analyzing their position on the built environment of Seoul; while experts, professors, and curators frame urban issues, through descriptions of nostalgia for tradition, minimalism and empty spaces; opportunities arising from the 2008 crisis; and the traditional concept of facade used to bend the rules of the F.A.R. Game.

© 2019 TCA Think Tank

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The Condition of Seoul Architecture

Pier Alessio Rizzardi

Interviewees 

Moon Hoon, Moon Hoon Architects

Gyoo Jang-yoon, UnSangDong 

Kim Dong-jin & Kim Yoo-jung, L’EAU design

Cho Min-suk, Mass Studies

Kim Young-joon, YO2 Architects

Hwang Doo-jin, Doojin Hwang Architects

Kim In-cheurl, Archium

Cho Byoung-soo, BCHO Architects

Kim Min-ji, ISON Architects

Kim Hyo-man, Iroje KHM Architects

Kim Jun-sung, Architecture Studio hANd     

Choi Moon-gyu, GaA Architects

Choi Wook, ONE O ONE Architects

Kim Jong-kyu, M.A.R.U. network

Ken Sungjin-min, SKM Architects

Kim Chan-joong, THE_SYSTEM LAB

Kim Seung-hoy, KYWC Architects 

Lee Jeong-hoon, JOHO Architecture

Contributing Authors

Choi Won-Joon, John Hon, Caroline Maniaque, Rafael Luna

Photographers

Iwan Baan, Kim Yong-kwan, Sun Nam-goong, Hwang Woo-seop