The Marmot’s Hole

Kim Swoo-geun (1931-86) was one of the fathers of Korean modern architecture and probably Korea’s most internationally recognized architect. Before passing away at the young age of 55 from liver cancer, he had elevated architecture in Korea from a trade into an art form. He strove to take Korean traditional architectural ideas of space and environment and incorporate them into modern architecture. In many of his creations, space and structures flow together naturally as they do in traditional Korean architecture. In an interview with U.S. current events magazine TIME, he summed up his architectural philosophy thusly:

“My home is the womb. The womb’s home is the mother, the mother’s home is the house and the house’s home is the environment. It’s wrong to think of a home as just a residence. It’s the environment. The environment becomes space philosophically, and space is the home of the home’s home.”

His legacy lives on with the SPACE Group, the architectural firm he founded in 1960.

Kim designed some 70 buildings in Korea, including Olympic Stadium, Jinju National Museum and the Arko Arts Center in Daehangno. I spent the last couple of days snapping photos of some of his other masterpieces around the country. The photos might not be the best, but try to enjoy them anyway.

Kyungdong Presbyterian Church (1981)

The church (official homepage–English and Korean) is a rather funky looking building in Jangchung-dong, not far from Jangchung Stadium and Dongdaemun Market. You need to climb the stairs to the right to reach the entrance, which is rather unusually placed at the rear. From the church homepage:

To enter into the main chapel you have to go through a path called the Meditator’s Walk. It is a long, uphill stairway that allows you to prepare yourself for a set-aside place for worship. For this reason the entrance to the chapel is on the back of the building. While you walk up the stairs, you will see the unevenly broken bricks that form the outer wall of the building. Ecumenism is what it is all about. All the different people of God are called and gathered here to build oikos, God’s church.

The interior is even funkier, although to be honest, I’ve never seen it—the church appears locked except when services are being held.

Tower Hotel (1969)

The Tower Hotel harmonizes rather well with the forested hillsides of Mt. Namsan. The main building was designed as a tribute to those nations that fought under the UN flag during the Korean War—there are 17 floors, one for each nation (including South Korea).

Freedom Center (1964)

The headquarters of the Korea Freedom League, it seems to serve mostly as a wedding hall these days. If you want to get married in a Commie-Free Zone, this would be the place to do it. In the background are N Seoul Tower and the National Theater of Korea.

Headquarters of the SPACE Group

Well, I’ll let the SPACE group do the talking:

This building is located in the heart of Seoul while manifesting its historical context: the place is crowded with the Korean-traditional-style houses and also with the modern-style structures which symbolize the modernization processes of Korea. In the neighbor, the Changduk Palace (Biwon) stands representing the history and time of Chosun.
The concepts which were attempted in Pompidu Centre such as the idea of human scale’ and organic composition of space are materialized in an increased intensity. The design less emphasizes the concepts of distance, angle, or size than those of closeness, division, continuity: amalgamation, and continuity. The “womb space” is realized here evoking various activities within a confined space. The strands of earthen blocks in varying thicknesses stress the depth of the side of the building. The concept of skip-floor is adopted while maximally compressing the height of a floor in the scale of human height. As coming up the triangular stairs slanted at an angle of 45 degrees, one can experience the unfolding of the multifarious spaces.

Yangdeok Catholic Church (1979)

This required a road trip to Masan, Gyeongsangnam-do. The church ain’t big, but it gives off a warm, cozy feeling. Like Kyungdong Presbyterian Church in Seoul, it uses red brick and you must climb a set of steps before entering. With a skylight above the altar, the design uses sunlight to great effect.

Jinhae Post Office

OK, this has nothing to do with Kim Swoo-geun. The post office was built in 1914 by the Japanese in Russian-style. It was along the way to Masan, so I figured it would be worth a looksie, being as I am into colonial-era architecture. It’s a pretty little building that was probably worth the stop. It would have been even nicer if the Black and White Coffee Shop, which I had read about in OhMyNews the night before, had been open. The Korean-style tea house, or dabang, opened in 1955 and has managed to keep its classic dabang look. Unfortunately, they were closed for the New Year holiday. Bummer.