SPACE Academia OPEN CALL 02
SPACE launched its first international open call for papers in February 2025, followed by a second call in September 2025. The theme of the second call, ‘Korean Housing and Architectural Discourse: A Cross-Cultural Diagnosis and the Quest for Alternatives’, was proposed by Sung Hong Kim, one of Chief Editors of SPACE Academia, with the aim of drawing attention to ‘Korean housing’ — a subject that has long been relegated to the margins of architectural discourse. Submissions were accepted until February 2026, followed by preliminary and final review. The review focused on how concretely, rigorously and provocatively each paper addressed Korea’s polarized housing landscape within an architectural framework, resulting in the selection of two winning papers. The two winning entries will be introduced across issues 706 and 707.
Abstract
The recurrence of 49-storey apartment towers is not accidental. Over the past decade, towers of this height have appeared on skylines across Korea, from redevelopment sites along Seoul’s Hangang River to projects elsewhere in the capital region and in regional cities. This article interprets that convergence not simply as market preference, but as an institutional vernacular: a practical design language formed at the intersection of regulatory thresholds, redevelopment finance, review practices, and established credibility of apartment complexes as assets. Drawing on 2015–2025 SEUMTER/eAIS building-administration records, public project materials, and field observations, it examines why a particular apartment package has been reproduced so consistently.
Situated immediately below Korea’s super-high-rise classification of 50 storeys or 200m, 49 storeys represents a practical compromise: it signals maximum height and landmark value while allowing projects to remain within relatively predictable regulatory, review, and financing processes. Using 49 storeys as a diagnostic lens through which to reveal the contemporary operation of this institutional vernacular, this article traces how long-established tower, typical-floor, and core grammars are combined with context-specific ground-plane organisations and reinforced through landmark rhetoric across different urban grounds.
Ultimately, 49 storeys reveals more than a skyline limit. It exposes the limits of a housing system in which other residential packages struggle to secure comparable approval, financing, management capacity, and social trust. Rather than merely an architectural choice, 49 storeys becomes a point of departure for asking which housing types have been made institutionally credible in Korea and which have been left at the margins.
See the full text of this paper in the attached file.
ChungYeon Won is a Professor of Architecture at Korea University and a U.S.-registered architect. She leads A.D.R.P (Architecture Design, Research, and Practice) Lab, where she pursues research and design projects in architecture and urbanism. She studied architecture at Korea University and the University of Pennsylvania. After working at SOM Chicago and Grimshaw Architects New York, she served as Associate Director at SOM’s New York, leading projects ranging from housing to large-scale mixed-use developments. Drawing on her experience with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport’s Integrated Public Housing Review Committee and Regulatory Reform Committee, and her current role on the Seoul Metropolitan Government Urban Planning Committee, her research examines how the interaction between design and regulation shapes architectural form and everyday urban life.
*chung_won@korea.ac.kr
SuAh Kim
SuAh Kim is a Master’s Student in Architecture at Korea University, working on research and design projects at A.D.R.P Lab. Kim explores how the interplay of regulation and design shapes housing typologies and urban form.