SPACE April 2024 (No. 677)
Creating a New Standard in Urban Religious Space that Relates to Everyday Life
Won Buddhism Yeoksam Temple, is located in the middle of a bustling red-light district. The renovation project, which transformed a five-storey neighbourhood living facility built in 2002 into a religious facility, is in line with the spirit of Won Buddhism, which advocates a religious practice closely related to everyday life. Beginning with the question ‘How can an urban religious facility encourage encounters between people through its appearance?’, we aimed to create an indoor environment for spiritual practice so that the Won Buddhism Temple can communicate smoothly with the surrounding urban context as a religion that is closely connected to daily life.
We wanted to make this temple a low-threshold religious building which members of the congregation could freely visit for relaxation in order to communicate closely with the local community. The existing closed exterior of the restaurant on the lower level is changed to expose interior transparently to the outside. The upper floors are reorganised to accommodate the space for Buddhist service and meditation. The...
Cho Yoonhee (GUBO Architects) + Hong Jihak (Chun
Do Uram
723-1 Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, Korea
religious facility
505.7m²
301.22m²
1,759.36m²
B1, 5F
11
21.7m
59.57%
277.15%
RC, steel frame
Sto, textile
paint, exposed concrete, Sto, wood floor, concre
Building Doctor Engineering
Doohyun
MK Chunghyo
DODUM Inc.
Feb. – June 2021
Aug. 2021 – Oct. 2022
Won Buddhism Yeoksam Temple