The Present Possibilities for Architectural Platforms
SPACE
Kim Green co-director, factory2
June Lee CEO and architect, Remark Press
Yim Dongwoo professor, Hongik University
Jeong Daeun manager of Urban Space Improvement Bureau, Seoul Metropolitan Government
Sustainable Platforms
SPACE Since everyone gathered here convenes a platform of their own, I think we can begin this survey of our present moment with self-reflection. First, I would like to hear from June Lee, who once submitted a proposal to Seoul School of Architecture (sa) for an alternative design-focused educational programme. Lee currently manages ‘Different Doors 238’, which is based on the concept of a ‘children’s workroom’. The activity theme is still education, but I assume there are differences in terms of subject, forms, and aims?
June Lee (Lee) I graduated as the first class from sa, and I stayed following graduation to work as its Director of Education for three years. After this period, I taught freshmen students in an architecture department of a university as an adjunct professor for eight years, and experienced how educational content can shape an individual. With private funding, I was able to establish the project Different Doors 238 in 2017 on a site adjacent to an elementary school, and the ‘workroom’ of the architecture department at the university became its governing management model. As students spend long periods of time in this empty space exploring diverse ideas and lines of enquiry, they grow and learn countless things. I saw this space as a potential gift to these children, offering them a blank slate. I have conducted this experiment for the past four years, and, this year, I am testing the possibility it has to pass beyond a single space to become a adaptable commercial model. Through my experience managing Different Doors 238, I became more interested in observing and archiving the ways in which people make use of conceptions of architecture rather than the architecture itself.
SPACE We are also joined by Yim Dongwoo who is both an educator and an architect. Recently, you opened an urban cultural platform named ‘Domansa’ at Seongsu-dong. Yim Dongwoo (Yim) As someone from academia, I have doubts about the influence exerted by academia in Korea. For example, in most architecture departments in Korea students are no longer expected to attend classes if they are hired by the second semester of their fifth year. This leads me to a question ‒ or want to know ‒ what kind of narratives are created by professors aside from those used in their classes, and who does what when a key theoretical discussion is raised in contemporary architecture? For example, when a subject is broached by academic circles in the U.S., it typically blooms into a recognised topic of discussion 5 ‒ 10 years later. Discussions concerning environmental issues and digital construction circles made the rounds in academic contexts for a while, before eventually making their way into more general discussion in architecture.
I wish that this same situation existed in Korea, which might propel innovation and frame new thinking, but professional architects are kept busy by their work while scholars unfortunately do not seem to be as aware of the importance of this transference of knowledge. With the hope of ameliorating this situation, at least some extent, I founded Domansa. Peter Eisenman ran the Institute of the 1970s was an actual pamphlet that prompted discussion. So I thought that, when a certain activity is sustained by an individual for long enough, this platform might evolve into a space that promotes discussion. So
