Archinect - News2024-11-05T18:54:55-05:00https://archinect.com/news/article/150025490/breaking-the-mega-block-by-dressing-it-unstudio-completes-exterior-work-on-south-korea-mass-housing-project
'Breaking' the Mega Block by 'dressing' it? UNStudio completes exterior work on South Korea mass-housing project Anastasia Tokmakova2017-08-30T17:02:00-04:00>2024-03-15T01:45:58-04:00
<img src="https://archinect.gumlet.io/uploads/p8/p8efy71srh0f514q.jpg?fit=crop&auto=compress%2Cformat&enlarge=true&w=1200" border="0" /><p>Over the past decade of South Korea's rapid urbanization high-density apartment development has become the most popular type of housing in the country, producing a myriad of identical, close-set, utilitarian blocks.</p>
<p>When in 2012 the Hyundai Development Company invited UNStudio to design an 'intervention' for two new residential developments in Daegu Wolbae, South Korea's fourth largest city, the firm proposed to simply re-skin the existing structures with multi-color panels. Their plan to break the homogeneity with color was inspired by the city's history of manufacturing clothing and textiles—the facade designs bare similarity to the texture of a fabric or a media screen. </p>
<figure><figure><p><a href="https://archinect.gumlet.io/uploads/ee/ee67y280xfu5mewr.jpg?w=1028" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><img src="https://archinect.gumlet.io/uploads/ee/ee67y280xfu5mewr.jpg?w=514"></a></p><figcaption>Image courtesy of Hyundai</figcaption></figure><p>On the urban scale, color was also utilized for zoning—as the architects put it, <em>not only reinforcing identity, but also establishing community, revealing principal access points and communicating the relationship between the inside and outside of the two mega-blocks.</em><br></p></figure>...