SPACE January 2026 (No. 698)
I AM AN ARCHITECT
‘I am an Architect’ was planned to meet young architects who seek their own architecture in a variety of materials and methods. What do they like, explore, and worry about? And how are architects in various regions expanding their own worlds in different ways? SPACE is going to discover individual characteristics of them rather than group them into a single category.
Office of Santo Architects
interview Moon Joowon Principal, Santo Architects × Kim Hyerin
Santo Architects: Like a Native Wildflowers of the Region
Kim Hyerin (Kim): How did you come up with the name Santo Architects?
Moon Joowon (Moon): I wanted a name with two syllables, containing a plosive consonant, and one that would be easy to pronounce in English. After thinking about it for a year, I realised I also wanted a name that would reflect my desire to create architecture grounded in locality. That’s why I chose santo (産土), meaning ‘the land one is born from’. Later I realised it could also be read as santo (山土), meaning ‘mountain and soil’.
Kim: Was there a particular reason you wanted to pursue architecture rooted in locality?
Moon: In my first firm, I worked mostly on designing single-family houses throughout various regions. Traveling to different places, I realised one day that even though I was standing in the middle of a city, I couldn’t tell which city I was in. It is evident that the lifestyles of people differ according to their surroundings—yet architecture everywhere looked the same to me. That made me ask, why? I think that’s when I began to imagine creating buildings that were truly suited to their regions—buildings like native wildflowers that grow by absorbing nutrients from the specific soil in which they stand.
Kim: You established Santo Architects in 2024. Why did you choose to open your office in Namhae, a place where you had no prior connections?
Moon: I planned to open my office outside of Seoul from the start. At the time, I was teaching a design studio at Kangwon National University, so Samcheok, Gangwon-do was a potential candidate. I also considered Daejeon, where my aunt resides and which is also g...
