SPACE September 2024 (No. 682)
Memories of Home
We first met 18 years ago in a sophomore design studio class at university. As we were the only people the same age in the studio, we got on like a house on fire. Obviously, being friends is one thing and working in architecture together is another, but we have a flexible relationship that straddles the line between friends and collaborators, even after the 10 years since we opened our office. The forms that architects advocate for are often based on their own preferences and priorities, and so it’s not hard to deduce that even the most close-knit of architects will find difficulty in collaborating on an architectural project. This is the biggest reason why people around us are curious about our relationship as friends and architectural collaborators, which has lasted for quite a long time. The answer to this question will provide a clue towards explaining our attitude regarding architecture. Since our relationship has evolved from friends to collaborative architects, we often have trivial and personal chats about childhood while we are discussing architectural practice. Though our conversations might seem insignificant, in retrospect, reflecting upon the scenes from our childhood and the episodes in the country house that served as our backdrop have given useful clues to the development of our architecture. Therefore, we believe that our architecture has originated from our own memories of home. In preparing for this frame, we had the opportunity to recover our fading memories and take a deeper look at the various houses that we have lived in since our childhood.
Jihyeon and Seonghak at a workshop studio in Spain, during their 4th year of university (2011)
(from left) Jihyeon and Seonghak on an architectural trip to Jeju Island, taken on rented scooters, during their 5th year of university (2012), during an architectural site visit to Gapado Island (2016), experimenting and installing a pavilion for the ʻAPMAP 2019 Jeju’ project (2019)
Seonghak, First House in My Memory: baekwoondong house
baekwoondong house was a single-storey western-style house with a large persimmon tree in a south-facing madang (yard). The madang was big enough for me (Seonghak) to ride my bikes, and my grandmother would sit on the floor and watch us play in the madang while playing fetch. ‘Sanghabang’ was a room which she told me not to enter because it was a haunted room, but, in reality, she made up the story as a last resort to prevent me from entering without her permission because she rented the room to a male university student. The maru (wood floor) was a cosy space where we used to peel and eat nuts on New Year’s Eve and make songpyeon, half-moon rice cakes on Korean Thanksgiving Day. I remember looking at the persimmons hanging from the eaves, waiting for them to ripen. Sliding doors facing the maru were covered with hanji, traditional Korean paper, with many patches on holes showing the trace of time. A thin sheet of hanji easily separated and connected the floor and room. Compared to those days, today’s triple-glazed windows seem less friendly. Although my family moved to Seoul and I have experienced many different housing types, baekwoondong house in my childhood is the most memorable one.
(left) Maru at baekwoondong house. From left: Seonghakʼs grandmother, older brother, Seonghak, youngest aunt, (right) Sketch plan of baekwoondong house
(left) Sketch plan of Jihyeonʼs grandmotherʼs house, (right) Sketch plan of yonggangdong house
Jihyeon, A Hideout for Adventure: yonggangdong house
yonggangdong house, which I (Jihyeon) lived in when I was an early-grade schoolchild, was attached to my parents’ restaurant. Both were single-storey buildings with a large madang. I cannot remember the exact layout of the house, but a few scenes come to my mind clearly, even 30 years later. When I was young, the approximately 70cm gap between the buildings made me feel more as if I was in a cosy hideout rather than a narrow space. In this gap, I used to squeeze myself in between the building to climb the gap by shoving my back against one wall and my legs against the opposite one, and still I can feel clearly the texture of the exterior wall on my back as if it was engraved there. I had nightmares of being swallowed up by a big snake for many nights, after I saw it creeping through the bushes in front of the pond in our madang. My family lived there for four years before moving to an apartment. I didn’t spend a long time in the house, but it left a deep impression on me, becoming the first place that comes to mind when I think of ‘home’.
Life in chebudong hanok (2016 – 2019)
Maternal Atelier: chebudong hanok
We were lucky to open our atelier at chebudong hanok. We spent three intensive years in the place, which was both office and home, acquiring our own standards for the right proportions of madang and building, and realising the importance of eaves. The eaves shielded us from the harsh sun and rain and provided a room for swallows to build a nest, softening wild nature into a gentle scene that humans could handle. In those moments, the maru beneath the eaves became our favourite space in the house. Around the house, there were many old houses with traces of various additions or modifications. The forms of addition are based on weight, height, materials, and simple details that could be easily handled by one or two people. Though the additions are messy, the scenes seem familiar because they were conducted by people who had a good grasp of the local landscape. They include eaves extended with light slate and supported by thin iron columns; flowerbeds and vegetable gardens made with bricks; brick fences without joints, and curious patterns of window guard on the street side. While we were staying at chebudong hanok, these personal scenes naturally permeated our daily lives and formed a deep connection between us, which soon evolved into an important theme of our architecture.
hooami (2020) ©Roh Kyung
Sketch plan of hooami
Life in hooami (2019 – 2022)
Architectural Monastery: Life in hooami
In December 2020, we left chebudong hanok and moved our office and home to hooami, a building we designed in Huam-dong. The tenants were already in place during the design phase and the space design reflected their lifestyles. We used the first and second floors of hooami as our office and partitioned one side to make two rooms of 1.7-pyeong (5.6m2) as our residence. The two rooms were partitioned by plywood with no soundproofing, so we could easily communicate from each room. For three years, we would go to the office five steps away in the morning and come back to our rooms at night, talking about architecture. We called it an architectural monastery. Of course, the small space could accommodate just a single bed and a small closet, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. Though the space was physically small, the sense of community between the residents connected them across their separate and private spaces. A much larger space than the residents’ private spaces was taken up by the activity area.
(left) Model of iwoojip. Jihyeon and Seonghak have built their own houses. Each house is a collection of positive experiences accumulated over time, reflected in features such as eaves, toenmaru, daecheong-maru, rafters, and more. (right) Photo of Jihyeon, Seonghak, and their family members taking a brief rest under the eaves while working on the landscaping of iwoojipʼs madang (2023)
(left) iwoojip, Seonghakʼs house (2023), (right) iwoojip, Jihyeonʼs house (2023)
A House Made of Triviality: iwoojip
From chebudong hanok to the architectural monastery in Huam-dong, our relationship as collaborators and cohabitants lasted over six years. People around us jokingly said that we would live next door even after we got married respectively. The joke became a reality, and now we are neighbours living in houses, we designed respectively in Yangpyeong-gun, Gyeonggi-do. While we were designing the houses, we looked at each other’s work as independent architects for the first time since we started collaboration. As if we agreed with each other in advance, both houses are single-storey buildings with a toenmaru under long eaves around a madang. Our memories of each other’s childhood homes mixed with the experiences of living together over the years, and as a result, we now live in similar houses. In the houses of our own design, we are establishing a new relationship as neighbours. And we are creating a new rationale for our architecture.
Refreshing shade under the eaves of chebudong hanok on a summer day (2017). After experiencing the hanok form shaped by Korea’s climate in Chebu-dong, the eaves have become an essential element in bus architects’ buildings.
Crushed texture on sogyumotable restaurantʼs exterior wall (2020). Jihyun still vividly remembers the bumpy texture of the exterior walls of his childhood home, yonggangdong house. ©Roh Kyung
forced vanishing point (2022). This pavilion project utilises a lightweight wood frame to emphasise the deep spatial sense of the eaves. ©Roh Kyung
From Personal Memories
From our childhood homes, to chebudong hanok, hooami, and our current home, iwoojip, our memories of the living spaces that formed the backdrop of our lives have become the root sources of our architecture. The starting points of our architecture were shaped not through our work, but through our residences, and this shows that experiential narratives are so important to us. Memories that are too simple and trivial to mention have provided clues to profound and essential themes. Whenever we start a new project, we draw them out one by one. Considering how to apply the form and mood of these memories to architecture is the starting point for bus architects.
Toenmaru under the eaves of the cat-tagonal house (2023). The height of the toenmaru, 35cm, is the same as the entrance of childhood home.
The entrance to a home on the third floor of hooami (2020). Upon entering, a narrow madang is the first thing one sees. The minimal madang is surrounded by the living room and bedrooms, reminiscent of the madang of the chebudong hanok. ©Roh Kyung
Alleyway of ilwolilji (2022). It brings back memories of the alleyways they often explored during their time living in Chebu-dong. The alleyways seemed endless, but the anticipation and imagination of where they might lead always excited them. ©Roh Kyung
