Belgian Fashion wears Green in Seoul

Sinsa-dong, the downtown Gangnam District of Seoul, is transforming today from quiet residential houses to trendy restaurants and upscale boutiques. One of the new neighbors is a Belgian fashion designer, Ann Demeulemeester, who opened her first Korean shop last year near Dosan Street. The three story building with subterranean floor is designed by Minsuk Cho (Mass Studies). The native Korean architect studied and built his professional experience in New York and the Netherlands working for Kolatan/MacDonald Studio, Polshek and Partners and OMA. He established Cho Slade Architecture in 1998 in New York with James Slade and in 2003, he came back to Korea to open his own firm, Mass Studies. Then he began his investigation to understand his new home, Seoul, where “intensely over-populated urban conditions” and “architecture in the context of mass production” have become norm. However, Cho bravely incorporated these rather harsh urban surroundings and transformed into a new urban form such as the Ann Demeulemeester Shop. Ann Demeulemeester Shop sits on the first floor of an organically shaped building covered in green with an Indian restaurant above and a multi-shop in the basement. The concept of the architecture “Synthetic Organism of Nature and Artificiality” is presented through continuous plantation from exterior to interior combined with concrete. Inside the shop, dark brown exposed concrete wraps the ceiling and the columns in organic shapes, building a soft round shell above the wooden floor, the only flat linear plane of the space. The round columns support the structure and in between the columns are arched glass openings at full height allowing maximum exposure from outside. Behind the large windows, bamboo trees are planted creating an illusion of forest. Just a few steps away from the alley of busy Gangnam district, the Avant-Garde Belgian design awaits in the forest of bamboo. There are three different types of plants used in this architecture; bamboo around the windows, Pachysandra on façade, and moss in the basement. The living façade is achieved by planting a geotexile with an herbaceous perennial, Pachysandra, an evergreen groundcover. The stairway leading to the basement is narrow and painted in white at the entrance and towards the basement, “gradually enlarges to become another organic shape”, and the walls change to “moss-covered subterranean cave.” The moss keeps the color of green, however changes the texture as if “to allude to moist underground caves.” The stairway from the basement continues to the second floor. The restaurant space is painted in white and holds linear round shaped windows with bamboo trees planted outside carrying first floor’s natural atmosphere. The restaurant can be divided into five spaces; second floor, top level, three-step-level floor between the second and top level, a hidden terrace at the rear of the top level, and a rooftop space accessed by stairs from the top level. Each space has its spatial characteristic, and they are intimately connected inside and outside. This bold attempt to combine natural and artificial elements complementing the site’s surroundings has achieved a successful result. Last month, at the 26th Seoul Metropolitan City Architecture Award, Ann Demeulemeester received the third prize in Non-Residence category. References “Ann Demeulemeester Shop”. Mass Studies. Space. December, 2007. Credits Photography by Yong-Kwan Kim. Images and information by Mass Studies.