Project Name: An architecture that preserves the memory of a forest fire
Architects: NAUxLab + USER
Architect of Records: EZI Architects
Location: Ulsan, South Korea
Size: 746 m²
Status: Built (2024)
Photographs: Suk Lee, Sungho Goh
Project Description:
The building is located on the site of a big fire in 2013 in Ulsan, South Korea. Such history defines the site’s locality, but memories of the past are disappearing. In this project, the architecture expresses the forgotten memories of the past as a building so that the memories are not forgotten entirely but preserved.
The client of this project took care of about 10 trees that had survived the fire by marking them with a red ribbon on the devastated land of the site. At first glance of such scenery, the design team decided to express the building with charred wood inspired by the painful memory of the fire and the surviving charred trees. The building is not the main character, but nature, the land, and especially the protected trees. Therefore, the layout of the building conforms to the site’s contour lines, minimizing civil engineering and becoming part of the existing nature. In particular, the southeastern courtyard, where three of the ten protected trees remain, creates a cut-out space where interior space and exterior nature communicate through the full-height curtain wall.
The east facade of the building is a mirrored surface on which nature finally overwhelms the architecture. Such design strategy again emphasizes that this project is not about celebrating architecture but the beauty of nature that changes with the seasons.
The design of the building mass is further developed with a doubly curved gable roof. The roof’s ridge does not run along the center of the building. Instead, a center line connects the two vertices on the diagonal plane, sublimating the building’s curved beauty into a three-dimensional double curve.
The first glance and entry sequence provide a holistic experience from which one can witness the harmony between the building and the surrounding nature. The entryway and water in front of the building control the speed at which people approach the building. Rather than simply crossing the water space, if you turn one or two times along the entrance road, your movement speed will inevitably decrease. At the same time, your field of vision will change, allowing you to view the building from various angles. Through this entrance route, visitors can fully appreciate the various sculptural beauty of the building’s curves before they enter the interior space.
Tan-Mok-Won is the first building in Korea to be composed of charred wood and to measure over 800 square meters. It can be said to be an architecture that satisfies all five senses, considering the tactile, visual, and olfactory stimulations provided by charred wood, water space, and sounds of nature, as well as the taste that can be pleased with the bakery inside.
