When I was practicing as an architect, I was always secretly amused by the ‘standards’ of architectural photography. We stage a building to look pristine, even though we all know it didn’t look like that an hour before the shoot and never will again. You make a pilgrimage to see a ‘masterpiece’ based on its most famous photo, only to find it covered in moss, laundry, or patinas—but to me, that is compelling. A building’s ‘original state’ is just an infinitesimal, ephemeral point in time, if it even exists. The real life of a building is much more glutinous, and I’m drawn to everything that escapes the frame: construction, maintenance, aging, afterlives. Film is the small crack through which I can enter that space.

Today’s Architecture for Tomorrow’s Earth: Junglim Architecture

 

For over 50 years, the Jeonil Building (currently Jeonil Building 245) stood as a landmark in Geumnam-ro, Gwangju, and a historic site for the May 18 Democratization Movement. However, it gradually lost its prominence following the relocation of the provincial office and the building’s deterioration. The 2015 opening of the Asia Culture Center sparked a public consensus to revive the building as a complex cultural space. Under the concept of ‘coexistence between old and new’, the design team focused on inheriting the spirit of May 18 and restoring the building’s symbolic value.

Today’s Architecture for Tomorrow’s Earth: Junglim Architecture

 

Completed in 1970, the Samilro Building (currently Samil Building) holds immense historical significance as a symbol of Korea’s modernisation and as architect Kim Chung-up’s first office project. As the nation’s first high-rise, it had aged significantly over 50 years and urgently required upgrades to serve as a modern office space. The design team pursued a renovation focused on preserving the building’s heritage while complying with current regulations. The goal was to maintain Kim’s original vision while reinforcing the internal structure and upgrading the curtain wall façade.

 

Like many young architects, a significant portion of the early work of AGIT STUDIO consisted of renovation projects. This is because, in Korea, buildings left behind by rapid urbanisation ‒ now aged and in need of repair ‒ remain ubiquitous. This interview addresses Muke Deungchon-dong, a renovation of a factory-type building located in a residential area, and Muke Samcheong-dong, a renovation of architect Kim Heon’s Vortex. There are no flamboyant extensions. Instead, AGIT STUDIO confronts these buildings with a question: why should it be preserved, and how? Using their answers as a beacon, they seek to read the layers of time embedded in small interventions, interpret the circumstances under which the buildings were constructed, and translate the cross-section of the contemporary city into architecture. Ki Jun Kim and AGIT STUDIO come together to discuss these two projects and the underlying attitude that informs them.

 

Our approach complements and respects the integrity of the adjoining SANAA building, while asserting its own distinct identity. The New Museum will be a synergistic pair working spatially and programmatically in tandem, offering a repertoire of spaces for the institution’s curatorial ambitions and diverse programmes. We stacked the required programmes exactly at the same level of the existing building – three floors of galleries, a permanent home for NEW INC, offices, and multifunctional education and event spaces – new and old conjoined. Ceiling heights of the newly connected galleries align on each floor, creating expanded space for exhibitions and a horizontal flow between the buildings.