The Healthy Coexistence of Architecture and our Planet: Tectonic Karma

My karma with Cho Namho began with our common interest in materials and construction. This originated from his architectural commitments on the one hand, and my interest as a critic and planner on the other. The consistency found in Cho Namho’s attitude and work is rare in Korean architecture. The first article that I wrote about his architecture was a short essay published in the spring of 2009 in a JoongAng Sunday series. There, I described his representative work at the time, the Kyowon Group Dogo Guesthouse (2000, hereinafter Kyowon Guesthouse), as follows:

‘The guest house is a multi-layered space. It is a deep space that pulls vistas near and far into harmony, as well as featuring a closed expansive roof and the lounge’s transparent glass. One enters the lounge. The expansive roof seen from the outside reappears inside as a high, sloping wooden ceiling. Five columns are traversing the lobby. Four tree branches grow from each column, supporting expansive roof beams and rafters. Because the members of the framework are slender and the material is uniform, they do not appear cumbersome at all. This type of structural member is referred to as glulam. It is a type of engineered wood formed by gluing several layers of standard elements together. It has excellent structural performance and is fire resistant. It is standardised Western industrial timber, often on scales of as 2×4 and 2×6, because the cross-sectional dimensions of the timber are measured in 2-inch increments. It can be used as long and slender pieces or wide and thin boards. By harnessing the timber’s properties to enclose and open space, the architect was able to create a deep and transparent space.’

‘Multi-layered space’, ‘deep and transparent space’. From a modern tectonic perspective, I wrote about the relationship between Kyowon Guesthouse’s spatial characteristics and its construction. This interest continued into a collaborative project with Cho Namho. In 2015, as curator for the architectural collection and inaugural programme of the Asia Culture Center, I devised the Architectural Production Workshop, a programme that initiated a 1:1 full-scale architectural element collection and supported the design, production, and collection of new innovative architectural elements. I selected wood as the theme for the first Architectural Production Workshop and invited Cho Namho and Kuma Kengo. Cho Namho’s theme at the time was ‘lightness and heaviness’. Can lightweight standardised wood elements possess the function and sensibility of traditional post-and-lintel timber beams and columns? Cho Namho referred to this pavilion project as a Tectonic Spatial Body (2015). Based on standard 60×60mm members, a special urethane connector was developed to assemble as columns and beams into groups of four. Beyond the conventional method of gluing square timbers to create heavy structural members, a construction system that would emphasise the proportion and lightness of the standard elements was developed. 

The karma between Cho Namho and I continued with Breathing Folly (2023) published here in this issue of SPACE. As the director of Gwangju Folly Cho Namho was the first architect I invited to participate. With our shared experience of Tectonic Spatial Body at the Asia Culture Center, I asked him to develop a sustainable and flexible wooden system and to create a mobile folly. Cho Namho not only accepted this brief but at our very first meeting immediately suggested idea of the Breathing Folly. This meant that he would expand the envelope design used partially in the roof of Inwang Mountain Forest Retreat (2020) toward the overall theme of the project. In the summer of 2022, in the midst of the design stage of Breathing Folly, Cho Namho won the competition for the Seoul Urban Art Project. Ecological Matrix; Breathing Net (2023, hereinafter Breathing Net) in Seoul Forest and Breathing Folly in the old urban centre of Gwangju were realised in collaboration with Supia Construction (principal, Lee Jusuk), an unparalleled wood design and construction consultant who has worked with the architect over many years. In the case of Breathing Folly, the special engineering systems of breathing architecture were developed in collaboration with the eminent environmental design consultant, Lee Byeongho (senior manager, Korea Real Estate Board). Breathing Folly is their collaboration in ten years, since the unrealised Eunpyeong Future City Housing project in 2013. Good karma meets and breeds good energy.

The idea of an architecture that breathes overturns the environmental paradigm of modern architecture. Like breathing in and out, it is the notion that buildings can actively engage with their environment. Houses are protected from above, below, and on all sides, with adequate openings to protect people. The spatial organisation of walls, roofs, and floors determines how a house interacts with its environment. We routinely recognise a house’s relationship to the adjoining land but forget that it is connected to a much larger world. The design of a house is bounded by building codes and urban planning regulations – floor area and building to land ratio, the distance between buildings, height restrictions, etc. – set out in the modern era. Spatial constraints are formulated for the public good. Yet in terms of energy, buildings continue to be approached as independent energy systems. Capitalist logic and its system of production dictate that buildings should be hermetically sealed from the outside world and that materials, regardless of their overall energy consumption, be sourced in the cheapest way possible. The building material industry – including building equipment, insulation, and waterproofing – focused on technologies to keep external air, heat, and moisture out. Furthermore, the mechanical circulation of indoor air became the universal system of the twentieth century. In the 1990s, especially in Europe, natural ventilation began to regain popularity, however, the assumption of the sealed building remains. Even as consciousness of climate change grew, a building’s energy is still mostly calculated as its own energy. 

Buildings are not independent energy systems. The energy they absorb or reject for their own efficiency does not disappear. Approaching architecture as part of an expanded energy ecosystem requires a paradigm shift. The methods and attitudes of architectural design must change as must the way we talk about architecture. While life cycle assessment mechanisms are becoming more sophisticated, the practice of architecture as part of a broad energy system remains sporadic. Paradigm changes do not occur suddenly nor do they require throwing everything away. Cho Namho’s three projects in this issue of SPACE are sites that explore this process of transition. Cho Namho’s breathing architecture continues the themes found in the Kyowon Guesthouse and Tectonic Spatial Body, but are inspired by the ‘weakness’ of wood. Of course, weakness and lightness are properties that go hand in hand. Wood consists of a molecular structure that contains many microscopic pores. At the same time, it is a polymer compound of simple, repeating molecular chains, making it a particularly strong material relative to its weight. Depending on the conditions of each project, Breathing Net and Breathing Folly exploit the weaknesses of wood in different ways. Breathing Net consists of lightweight wood that has been organised into honeycomb-shaped structural units. It is a form that enhances the venue’s acoustics as well as a means of being receptive to various living phenomena. The porosity of the wood’s molecular structure leads to the porosity of the architectural form, which then leads it to be part of the ecosystem. It is a clear architectural presence in the park, embracing wind and sound, sunlight and seeds.

As a type of facility, Breathing Folly is very different from Breathing Net, and therefore adopted a different design methodology. Breathing Folly, with an indoor space accommodating about ten people, was designed to support a small outdoor neighbourhood space. At first glance it may appear to be a hermetic building, but it is in fact intended as an open resting place for local residents. The project sustains many aspects of a breathing architecture: a layout based on daylight levels and solar energy efficiency, a spatial composition with openings that promote natural ventilation, walls made of standard wood elements, and a layer of highly permeable cellulose insulation made from recycled paper. As the interior space became more important, the initial plan of mobility through disassembly had to be adjusted and the entire structure was designed to be transported. With this continued assumption of mobility, the entire structure was built at Supia Construction’s factory in Incheon, allowing for the realisation of exquisite details.

‘Light’, ‘heavy’, ‘strong’, ‘weak’, ‘open’, ‘closed’. From Kyowon Guesthouse to Breathing Folly, the words of the architect and the critic are modifiers of our senses as well as relatively quantified qualities. They are simultaneously subjective experiences and representations of physical properties. Since the nineteenth century, this relationship has been called tectonics. The karma between Cho Namho and I began with tectonics. It is also tectonics that has led us to contemplate the issues posed by climate change. In the era of climate change, though the fact that architecture is based on material systems remains unchanged, we must change our attitude toward materials. Just as the twentieth century differs from the nineteenth century, the tectonics of climate change will be different. Cho Namho’s work makes us consider what to maintain and what to change. Breathing Net, Breathing Folly, and E-MAX system Headquarters (2023) are the most modern of the architect’s oeuvre. The exemplary virtues of modern architecture, such as open spaces and simplicity, as well as the classical norms of proportion and detail, are convincingly embodied in these projects. They demonstrate that we do not need to discard all our presupposed norms and methods. We must instead learn a new architecture through trial and error, exploration, and experiment. Climate change is expansive and so our responses to it must also be. It is clear, for example, that we need to reduce our reliance on concrete. At the same time, we must find better ways to engineer and design concrete, to recycle concrete waste, to develop carbon capture techniques during production, and to industrialise cement alternatives. The problem is that we do not have much time. The consequences of climate change are difficult to anticipate for specific regions. The so-called ‘local’ disasters are occurring much faster than expected: the flooding in Pakistan, the desertification in China, wildfires in Canada, the disappearance of honeybees and frogs, and rapidly dying coral systems are themselves massive disasters that signal structural change. The role of architecture in these global situations appears insignificant.

Architecture is small but important. Is it not climate change that teaches us everything is connected? Regardless of how minor the influence of architectural change is, it is an essential force in the earth’s ecosystem. Change is both the fuel and emblem for life. A living thing has the capacity for change; but change is not guaranteed. A life force is sustained by responding to and adapting to changes in the environment. In the 2009 JoongAng Sunday essay, I wrote about the life force of the architect:

‘Cho Namho is an architect who confronts the world in a direct fashion. It is a strength that allows him to approach his work without prejudice. Even when encountering difficult situations and difficult people, he faces the problem head on and solves them through open dialogue. He never lets his ego or pride get in the way of his work. It is here that one is moved and here where trust is built. His greatest return from this process is learning. He believes that you can learn from anyone. He learns from the client, the carpenter, the engineer, and his staff. Most importantly, he learns from the site.’

You can see more information on the SPACE No. October (2023).