SPACE November 2024 (No. 684)
For this OPINION, we sought the opinions of experts in architecture and related fields, focusing on design competitions, which are the primary method of selecting architects and architectural proposals for public cultural facilities in Korea. The responses have been excerpted and edited to the extent that they do not stray the intentions of the original text.
Participants
Kim Ahyeon professor, University of Seoul
Kim Hyunsu co-principal, eSou Architects
Nam Sangmoon principal, DAYPLACE
Maing Pilsoo professor, Seoul National University
Yoon Geunju co-principal, 1990 urban architecture office
Lee Jeonghoon principal, JOHO Architecture
Lee Chihoon partner, SoA
Yim Dongwoo professor, Hongik University
Lim Sunghun professor, Tongmyong University
Cho Namho principal, Soltozibin Architects
Cho Jaewon principal, 0_1 Studio
Zo Hangman professor, Seoul National University
Hwang Doojin principal, Doojin Hwang Architects
Q5.
What should be prioritised in the design of public cultural spaces today?
Kim Ahyeon Whenever I go to consultation meetings related to urban design or architecture, I am often surprised how there is a general lack of concern for global crisis. Climate crisis is real, and our generation is bound to address global issues. We need to consider alternative sustainable cultural discourses in all fields that deal seriously with space.
Cho Jaewon Within this summer alone there have been multiple reports of natural disasters related to climate crisis across the globe. The architectural design of one site is urban design that will last for 10 or even 100 years. Therefore, all public architecture regardless of its location or programme must be guided by a basic principle and awareness regarding the dangers of climate crisis. The necessity and validity of adding not just buildings but new urban public cultural spaces must be discussed and examined from the perspective of responsive urban transformation in climate crisis. When I observe the recent design competitions for public cultural spaces in Seoul, I wonder if it is just me, but everyone seems quite indifferent as though there is a second earth that we can move to if needed.
Maing Pilsoo I hope that there will be more cases like the Gusan-dong Village Library which prioritised discussions between local residents and local governments regarding the significance, location, and role of a local library before the competition and fostered a local community that continues to operate and care for the library even today.
Lee Chihoon The core value of an urban architectural space produced by the public is that it exists ‘for everyone’. The building does not make an architecture public, but publicness must be the base condition of any public architecture. The idea ‘architecture for everyone’ might sound abstract, but it provides a certain philosophical direction to the architecture. Seattle Central Library is one of those cases where the philosophy of ‘library for everyone’ was well implemented through an architectural design strategy.
Nam Sangmoon Since public cultural spaces, urban parks, plazas, and streets are urban fabrics that exert great influence over the cityscape and identity, continuity is important. But currently ongoing projects by SMG demonstrate how policies are decided on the fly without proper discussion and buildings are torn down and rebuilt whenever there is a change of seats in government. Aside from the issues of waste of resources and environmental pollution, these projects fundamentally undermine the city’s continuity and make it fragmented and anonymous. Existing buildings must be continued to grow and evolve along with changing society for their long survival.
Zo Hangman Many civic cultural centres remain empty. They lack the manpower and budget to organise and provide quality cultural content. This could be compensated if the building itself was a high-quality architecture. Regardless of their programmes, the world’s most visited attractions continue to satisfy cultural demand just by existing. The history, tradition, aesthetics architectural techniques, and all the labour that went into creating that space—these are already enough. The best cultural spaces in the world are beloved by the public regardless of their content.
Q6.
Many design competitions aim to produce ‘iconic’ and ‘creative’ architecture. Are the practices and systems that inform today’s design competitions appropriate for the creation of such architecture? If not, what are the obstacles?
Kim Hyunsu To produce an original, complete, and creative architecture that is more than just a design that wins competitions, one needs time to explore experimental methods and new materials. One then needs to prove at least in part the feasibility of such new attempts via mock-ups on site. These must all be achieved within the competition schedule. However, the reality is that the time given is too short to even follow the basic guidelines and that it comes with a great risk to try something creative and unique.
Kim Ahyeon It is problematic that design competitions are carried out before reflecting on appropriate financial and administrative support systems for their operation. The opinion of the operator or the user rarely gets considered during the design competition stage. Another serious problem is that the design competition is too architecture focused. The creation of contemporary spaces requires interdisciplinary collaboration to go beyond compartmentalised imaginative ideas, but eligible applicants are usually limited to licensed architects. ‘Collaborators’ including landscape designers are often relegated to uncredited shadow labour. Depending on the nature of the project, qualifications and crediting issues must be amended at the planning stage to enable joint applications by licensed architects and other professionals in related disciplines.
Lee Chihoon Creative architecture begins with planning and owner requirement (OR) that promotes creativity. As such, the issue lies again in planning.
Maing Pilsoo Putting aside the question of how much we need ‘iconic’ and ‘creative’ architecture in our society, what is most important is that we secure a realistic construction and design budget. While it might be possible to compensate for shortcomings of planning during the design phase, however, absolute lack of construction budget cannot be resolved through design. I was disappointed to see many impressive projects nominated in design competitions get postponed, canceled, or drastically modified because of financial constraints. If the budget is already determined, planning should be carried out in a way that is proportionate to that set budget.
Nam Sangmoon I was shocked when I visited Kadare Cultural Center (2011) in Yurihonjo, Japan around a decade ago. It was because there was a high- quality cultural art facility in a small seaside rural village of about 70,000 population. To improve the state of our public architecture that is often low-cost and low-quality, more investment is needed. Instead of finding reasons to cut costs, one should approach public architecture as a form of universal welfare for all citizens.
Zo Hangman Upon analysis of competition guidelines, there are surprisingly few design competitions that demand ‘creative’ and ‘iconic’ architecture. Even if there are, it is impossible to make such architecture under current competition practice and system. The topmost priority of recent highly contested public design competitions is the procurement of a fair and unbiased review process. Even though Gadeokdo New Airport and Lee Kun-Hee Museum were both projects with great significance to the country, the review panel was not publicised beforehand for the sake of fairness. In fact, the review panel was decided on the examining day itself by phone in the morning from a pooled list to invite whoever could find the time to participate. It would take a ‘god of architecture’ to be able to comprehend, analyse, and rank dozens of results that licensed architects took at least 2 – 3 months to create, and unfortunately, there are not many ‘gods of architecture’ in Korea to fill such a list. In a design competition where there are no right or wrong answers, judges avoid showcasing their personal expertise and ideas during the review. This is because they want to avoid being accused of bias towards particular designs. Creative interpretations then become targets of focused fire. Because of this, it is often the case that designs that have no particular weaknesses that are picked over those with many good features that are respectful of a competition’s aims. Another serious problem, aside from the review stage, is the unrealistic project cost and project plan conditions such as unreasonable building to land ratio and floor area ratio. Competition sites are getting smaller and smaller, the list of conditions required by public ordering organisations exceed legal requirements, and budgets are tight. Recently, I was asked to judge at the Munhwa Pedestrian Bridge design competition which reviewed proposals from five teams who were picked and funded by the International Design Competition to Pedestrianising Jamsu Bridge in 2023. However, during the first planning competition, the provided construction cost was reduced by more than half while conditions to meet flood and other disaster-resistant features were emphasised. Most of the ideas that were picked during the 2023 competition became unfeasible, and so this project continues to drift aimlessly.
Cho Namho I recently participated in a public housing competition that called for innovative proposals, and despite my reinterpretation of a generic courtyard residential format and a great review team, I was disappointed by the lackluster discussion and feedback. A few years ago, I was asked by SMG to be the Master Planner (MP) of a competition that called for innovative and boundary-pushing creativity. There I witnessed the elimination of numerous promising proposals along with half of the total participants during the initial screening process. What could be done to raise the quality of the review process to match the capabilities of the architects?
Hwang Doojin If the recent Olympics scandal concerning the exposure of various sports organisations taught us anything, it is that competitiveness emerges from fairness and transparency. As history has shown, there is serious corruption shaping the architectural scene in relation to design competitions. Design competitions that are conducted without any discussion or an unpublicised review process are all hotbeds for corruption. While there can be contrasting opinions regarding the disclosure of the review panel, however, we must respect the participant’s rights to be informed as one’s decision to participate can be affected by those on the jury. When there are instances of corruption, aside from applying legal penalties, the offending party must also be marginalised as a ‘public enemy’ and appropriate actions should be taken accordingly. Practically speaking, architectural organisations such as the Korea Institute of Registered Architects should take the initiative in this matter.
Q7.
Within the context of globalisation, are today’s design competitions fair and competitive? Or is there a need to improve the competitiveness of Korean architects?
Kim Ahyeon Aside from a general lack of appreciation toward professionals by clients, today’s design environment is inconducive to the nurturing of competitive architects. I find it difficult to convince my students that design is a good career choice. How can we secure talent when the most talented are no longer going into design?
Yoon Geunju We have good players, but only a few. Hence, it is disadvantageous for us if we get dragged into a long match. The same logic applies not only for sports but also for architectural design competition. We can discuss fairness after we have secured a team of professional reviewers.
Kim Hyunsu Despite potential concerns that participation of star architects might create an unbalanced prestige-based competitiveness that would be disadvantageous to local architects, if we could selectively invite world-class architects in line with the competition’s aims, I believe that this would provide an opportunity for the Korean architectural scene to greatly benefit from observing their professional knowledge, innovative technology, and creative design approaches and methods in their respective architectural fields. Moreover, it might even become the springboard for Korean architects to become more competitive in international competitions.
Cho Namho Compared to international architects who have excelled in line with their higher construction and design budgets and engineering support, local architects are at a disadvantage. However, there is no reason to not invite international architects, nor should there ever be. While enhancing the quality of local competition and the realisation process of winning projects and thereby improving our competitiveness in general remain yet as unresolved tasks, however, it also remains unchanged that these are things that we must work toward. It also falls on us to feel ashamed that many of the domestic works by international architects did not stray from their original intentions despite the shortcomings in planning.
Nam Sangmoon It would be great if a skilled international architect were to open an office in Korea. It would contribute a lot to the development of our architectural culture. However, the problem with recent nominated competitions that invite star architects is that only international architects are given relaxed regulations, increased design and construction fees, and various administrative leeway. […] Another issue is that because the pool of star architects is small, the same firms are repeatedly nominated. While Zaha Hadid, MVRDV, UNStudio, and Herzog & de Meuron are all architects that peaked during the 2000s, it feels as though they are no longer in touch with the most recent architectural trends. The committee who decides these nominations need to widen their horizons beyond the usual few.
Yim Dongwoo Fairness is good, but it is also tyrannical. Many years ago, I had to make a selective list of 100 architects in Korea. My client, the public office, then told me that since it would be unfair for the curator to make the list oneself, I should instead send letters to three architectural institutes to ask each of them to recommend 20 – 30 architects. I could not but ask myself what fairness really means. […] Rather than criticising it as unfair when international companies are given extra leeway in terms of construction costs and administrative processes, we should use it as a precedent and turn it into a universal norm that should apply to all other public architectural projects.
Lee Chihoon Transitioning into a globalised design competition market is inevitable. Regardless of the market scope, the fairness of design competitions depends on the fairness of the review. Fairness of review is founded on a mutual agreement that is established through discussion between jury members and their own critical evaluations. A qualitative judgment, that is more than just a formalised equality based on a point system, is necessary, and such results can only be achieved by a team of professional and critically aware reviewers. The evaluation report of the design competition for extension of the Gösta Serlachius Museum in Finland in 2011 is a good example of a design competition review that became a platform for critical discourse.▼1
Lim Sunghun The pitfalls of recent international architectural competitions are unrelated to problems of fairness or the level of competitiveness of Korean architects. Rather, it is the shallow way of thinking by the people in power such as local government leaders who, oblivious to what people want or is needed, make arbitrary decisions regarding public architecture according to whatever one thinks is best.
Zo Hangman Few countries treat their own architects as poorly as in Korea. Due to different cultural backgrounds, their works might look unique for some time. Take GS Tower built by SOM in 1999, for example. It used to be one of our iconic buildings that became the subject of case studies for architectural students, but today it is just one of the many buildings that line Teheran-ro in Gangnam. Korean architects are competitive enough. They are just restrained and stunted after being forced to adapt to tight design budgets, minimal construction costs, and insufficient design time for decades. If Korean talented architects were given the chance to work on projects under similar conditions, they would produce results that are not only comparable to those done by star architects but are also more suited to Korean culture and context.
Hwang Doojin It is inevitable and only right that projects of any scale or social importance are brought to the level of international competition. As we can see from other sectors of society such as retail, music, movies, and other manufacturing industries, competitiveness is meaningful when it is globally competitive. Market protection is a path to extinction in the long run. It is unreasonable to assume that international review members are always more impartial and transparent. Their connections to the Korean architectural community might be more private and subtle. Since we cannot have full knowledge of every individual’s intentions regarding this matter, what is important is that we at least institute a system that ensures fairness and transparency. The review panel should be disclosed in advance, the legal liabilities of making prior contacts between participants and jury members should be clearly stated, and the review process including discussions must be publicised. If a jury member violates these regulations, his or her actions must be made known to the international architectural community.
Q8.
What practical role(s) do you think architects should play in the planning, development, and realisation (or delaying and stalling) of policies related to production of cultural spaces? What limitations are there in the current domestic context?
Kim Ahyeon Production of space has been, is, and will always be political. If you were to make suggestions that contradict the policy established by the administrative leadership, you would naturally get excluded. If the Presidential Commission on Architecture Policy that oversees that entire country’s architectural policies is not interested in addressing such issues, there is nothing that an individual architect can do. But we can still look for alternative solutions: that is, to look for ways to maintain consistency in the entire process of space production from an institutional and policy perspective. Or perhaps we could initiate master planner competitions or planning competitions. It would be great if the significance of diagnosing problems, identifying sites, envisioning programmes, and planning creative spaces and the roles and positions of professionals behind these works were more clearly defined. It would be ideal if the rationale for planners to act as master planners and as coordinators between designers and clients throughout the entire project were established and implemented.
Yoon Geunju Project planning for public architecture begins years before architects come to hear about it through calls for a design competition. In other words, architects today are not orchestra conductors. Rather, architects are closer to a handyman who ‘always shows up whenever something is up’. Practically speaking, architects are handymen who are called only to enhance the technical proficiency of public architectural work. Are we still up for it?
Lee Jeonghoon For more complete planning and realisation of projects, architects should become more actively involved. However, due to the low understanding of architectural planning, there is a lack of specific diversity in architectural solutions. Professional architects with rich experience should be brought in during the planning and execution stages to improve final quality. To realise this, policies should be enacted to ensure that architects with a broad range of experience that covers various aspects of architecture are invited to work at the planning and realisation stages. However, due to a lack of awareness towards planning among policymakers, there is no budget set aside to hire and consult such professionals. Instead of lowering consultation fees, a more realistic budget should be proposed to attract skilled architects.
Lee Chihoon Architecture is fundamentally an activity of practical discourse. Texts, drawings, exhibitions, and publications all constitute the architect’s practice, and buildings are the result. As society becomes more complex, the boundaries of discourse are becoming blurred, and spaces are being produced from mutual interactions between the building’s exterior and interior. In such a situation, architecture becomes subject to diverse and complex demands from the outside. For architecture to stay relevant to the production of cultural and public spaces, it must offer its professional and critical views to this platform of mutual discourse.
Yim Dongwoo Designing public architecture is only one small responsibility of an architect. Listening to the opinions of local residents and shaping their abstract ideas into reality are also the tasks of architects. When Japanese architects headed to the disaster zone after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, they probably did not go there to win a design project. Even outside of such disaster situations, there are tasks that architects can perform.
Cho Namho When it comes to making decisions, the architect should have equal status with the client. In the current hierarchical structure, however, it is difficult to maintain design consistency. The system of design implementation during the construction phase has also been downgraded into a mere customer service. According to a Spanish architect working in Korea, architects in Spain work with one licensed architect from the client’s organisation when making decisions. The licensed architect coordinates with various clients of multiple areas and discusses the integrated results with the architect on a 1-on-1 basis. According to this Spanish architect, a project of similar scale that took six months in Spain took one year and half in Korea.
Cho Jaewon What is surprising about the production process of public cultural spaces is that the actual channels through which the needs of potential users might get conveyed are restricted and, in many cases, tailored to the producers’ perspectives and conveniences. In addition to responding to the client’s requirements, architects are called to listen and collect the voices of current and future actors such as the operators, potential users, and the coexisting environment. Making unheard voices heard is also the task of the architect. While participating as Master Architect (MA) or Professional Advisor (PA) might be enough to contribute to the overall narrative, however, it would be at some point near impossible to implement new actors and their narratives to the production of cultural spaces unless one also commits to detailed on-site research.
Zo Hangman The internet might be full of fragmented information and data about space and architecture, and anyone might discuss architecture, but designing architectural space is a highly specialised craft. Architecture that is designed by someone who is not architecturally taught, trained, and qualified is dangerous. We should give more power and responsibility to architects. Qualified and capable architects should be given control over the production of cultural spaces, policymaking, planning, development, and realisation. As an example, since Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education introduced the Master Architect system, the quality of newly built school architecture as exemplified in the case of Dream Classroom has dramatically improved.
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1 (Editor’s footnote) This report collects all comments made by the review panel regarding the 55 submissions that were either highly ranked or received honorable mentions.The jury convened six times to review the 579 proposals submitted, created a general evaluation form template, and used the design competition as a foundation to conduct a debate on themes such as preservation of original buildings and connection between environment and architecture.
OPINION : Design Competition as a Means of Producing Public Cultural Spaces ① (Link)
