Two European precedents

Chatting to Beni a while ago about my ideas of traversing the retaining wall and perhaps considering steps as part of my gift, she kindly pointed me towards some European examples that also deal with movement across steep slopes:

Adept and LIWPlanning, Måløv Axis
Ballerup, Denmark, 2010

Stepped seating (adeptarchitects)

This project connects the new district Søndergård with the old part of the suburb Måløv across two large traffic barriers, Frederikssundsvej and the S-train line. It is an extensive landscape project but I am interested in the part pictured above. The stepped seating creates a new condition on the slope. This has similarities to the retaining wall study at Seonyudo Ecological Park which takes elements in the landscape and reconsiders their function. For example, at Seonyudo, a wall becomes a seat, and in Ballerup, a seat becomes a step.

La Granja, Escalator
Toledo, Spain, 2000

Cutting and folding the landscape (Jose Antonio Martinez Lapena and Elias Torres)

The historic city of Toledo has struggled to make vehicular and pedestrian routes compatible. The escalator and staircase transport pedestrians from a car park at the lower part of the city, to the upper part. The staircase is divided into six tracts which zigzag across the landscape. A retaining wall folds over to provide shelter and ‘give continuity to the landscaped slope of the hillside’1. At night the staircase and escalator transform into a fissure of light cut into the vertical face of the city.

A stair-wrapped church

Photo and plan diagram

After visiting Welcomm City, we stopped to see this incredible church which is surrounded entirealy by a series of brick steps - an interesting way of moving across sloping land.

Welcomm City - ARU and IROJE Architects

Having wanted to visit this building for so long, I had high expectations. On approach, the four little houses perched atop the concrete base subtly adjust their orientation along the curving street, as if nodding to passers-by. However, the monolithic rusty corten facades are somewhat stark and harsh. It was interesting to find out later from Florian Beigel that it was Seung’s insistence that corten was used!

Moving closer, the consideration and care apparent in so much of IROJE and ARU’s work reveals itself strongly. Walking up the series of entrance steps into the central courtyard, I began to appreciate the usefulness of empty or ‘purposeless’ space1. The building could have been designed so that doors next to the street opened up straight into an internal foyer, allowing more square footage for exhibition space. However, as Beigel might describe it, Welcomm City offers a ‘gift’ to the city with its semi-open courtyard. From the courtyard, glimpses through the various levels of the building become visible, unfolding a series of routes across the vertical landscape.

L-r: Looking in, looking out, looking between

The changes between levels are so far removed from the situation in Hongie; from street level to upper level. The study below concentrate on the stepped circulation.

Plan diagram illustrating level changes (lighter-darker, lower-higher)

Hongjie currently

Drawing the existing: A high retaining wall divides two communities; the exclusive Apatu development cuts off routes to the mountain. How can the retaining wall become a focus of activity; how can routes through be re-established?

Existing: conceptual stekch view

More to follow..

DMZ: a barrier between two nations

Looking towards the central demarcation line

L-r: wall of ribbons, freedom bridge, barbed wire fence

The Demilitarised Zone, on 38th parallel marks the barrier between North and South Korea, once a united country. It can be considered as a wall, living up to the negative connotations in the dictionary definition below. An extrapolation perhaps of a retaining wall dividing two communities?

Considering the permeability of walls in Hongjie, the DMZ wall tries to prevent movement in or out of either country. North Korea has managed to dig several tunnels along the border and recent violence between the nations has once again threatened its protective control.

Gift project: a potential site?

Plan diagrams l-r: building heights, current routes, main circulation through (retaining wall in yellow)

A typical example of city meeting landscape, Hongjie is not dissimilar to many neighbourhoods in Seoul. As mentioned in the post when I first visited area, as one emerges from the tube station to street level, a bustling shopping street is revealed with mountains lurking on the horizon behind.

I am interested primarily in the long retaining wall which now acts as a barrier between neighbourhoods just off the main street. Currently, retaining walls guide us around the city but are there alternative ways of moving around them? This returns to the idea of ‘one-sidedness’. At Hongjie the retaining wall divides an older low/mid-rise residential area from a new Apatu development which cuts off the mountain from the city.

Site section: main road, retail, mid-rise, apatu, mountain

How is the wall traversed? How have circulation routes changed since its construction? How does city meet landscape?

Landscript by H-Sang Seung

I was first referred to Seung by Haewon Shin, after I described my interest in the Korean approach to landscape Most recently, I read Landscript which has confirmed some previous ideas and widened my horizons in terms of understanding Seoul’s landscape. Some notes and comments:

‘If there was a mountain, it had to be leveled; if there was a valley, it had to be filled in; if there was a river, it had to be redirected’.1

Seung places much of the blame of Seoul’s skyline today on a greedy Western influence. Towers – which now dominate much of Seoul’s skyline – originally emerged as an architectural form of compensation. Multiple stories distinguish from other buildings, but with so many now, they have become almost indistinguishable from one another. Seung argues that Seoul doesn’t need to emulate landmarks of Paris’ Eiffel tower or Dubai’s Burj Khalifa because the landscape is a landmark in itself. It gives Seoul its identity. Perhaps this is an unrealistic suggestion for a world city but Seung argues that older buildings were built at a scale so as not to damage the natural landmarks, thereby respecting the landscape.

From Inwangsan towards the city (Ian Cooper)

“Seoul was not based on a diagram. Among the 20 cities in the world with a population of 10 million people, Seoul is the only metropolis located within a mountainous region. This is the element that distinguishes Seoul from all other metropolitan cities… Its mountainous geography is the most important element in recording the 600-year urban history of Seoul, a period beginning with its designation as the capital of the Joseon dynasty… There are four inner mountains – Bugaksan, Naksan, Namsan, and Inwangsan – and four outer mountains – Bukhansan, Yongmasan, Gwanaksan, Deokyangsan… The mountainous landscape is in itself the landmark of Seoul”.2

L-r: Map of Seoul with fortress wall 1765, Map of Palmanova - venetian star fort 17th century

Of many examples, Seung notably mentions Palmanova, a radial, hierarchical city where the land has been altered to make a diagrammatic city work. It is a city severed from the land, where surroundings were considered the enemy. A moat was dug and a high castle walls built to ward off evaders. Comparatively, the old city of Seoul has a peripheral fortress wall, not dissimilar to Palmanova. However, Seoul was chosen as Korea’s capital due to its location within mountains, a natural form of defense. Seung claims Palmanova illustrates that the ‘ethics of the land’3 was an unfamiliar concept in Europe, and that this has resulted in western ideas trampling the Korean landscape. Whereas old cities sustained the logic of the land, development simply became an accumulation of money-hungry towers.

Korean hillside neighborhoods are a typical feature of Korean urban landscapes. Seung mentions ‘Daldonge’ which is located on a dramatic topography, not dissimilar to some areas I’ve been exploring in Seoul. The road layout is not only a circular network but they include communal courtyards, a meeting place, a playground… ‘It is architecture molded from the land.’4 Such communities, along with the Shamanist village on Inwangsan have been torn apart by pockets of redevelopment all over Seoul. Daldonge as remembered by Seung no longer exists.

Richard Sennett’s Wallenberg Lecture in1998 entitled “The Spaces for Democracy” spoke of a decentralised democracy having not only political, but visual dimensions too. Many prefer the jumbled, polyglot architecture of neighborhoods to the symbolic statements made by big central buildings. This is an issue I hope to address this year, thinking of older neighborhoods verses large complexes that dominate much of the city today.

“Teomuni” is a pattern that is inscribed on the ground, almost like a pattern of retaining walls revealing the nature of the landscape in Seoul. Like the palimpsest of a continuously re-written piece of parchment, landscape – an  infrastructure within it – reveals of what once was.

Hongjie: A revisit

A long retaining wall, dividing two communities

A typical scenario in Seoul, Hongjie reveals the layers of the edges of the city. As we begin to consider a site for the gift project, I have decided to return to the place where I first starting looking for retaining walls.

Plan diagram drawn during visit

The apatu development behind the long retaining wall disconnects the older mid-rise buildings from the mountain. Routes through to the landscape are almost non-existent.

Apatu meets mountain

Re-thinking the language

Retaining walls are a fundamental structural element of Seoul's infrastructure. Up to this point, I haven't thought much about the two words and their meanings. I have been encouraged to think about what the term ‘retaining wall’ means, and possibly propose a more appropriate term for them for this project.

Definitions from Oxford dictionary online

Above is a breakdown of the dictionary definitions. I was struck mostly by the repeated negative words used to describe ‘wall’. Instead of thinking of retaining walls as preventative barriers, we should think of them as something that introduces a new ground condition. They provide a new way of reading the city and defining the landscape. A series of verbs reinforces their potential: linking, cutting, folding, threading, guiding, layering...

Understanding the ground conditions at Inwangsan

Axonometrics: Retaining walls in APT development, retaining walls in Inwangsan village - representing materiality, integration and hierarchy of circulation routes

As mentioned in previous blogposts, Inwangsan presents two clear distinctions of types of retaining walls. The first can found around the APT development, and the second in the village. It is important to consider the positive aspects of the village in order to understand why the retaining walls at the APT’s have such a negative impact on the streetscape. Three observations:

1 Materiality and construction of retaining walls

Apatu: Tall and long concrete walls with textured concrete surfaces. Monogamous and blank vertical screens cut of new developments from existing urban fabric. From discussions, this is a problem for developers who often employ artists to try and improve the appearance, but is this enough?

Village: Variety of materials and construction give clues about the process and order of development of the village. They give a sense of time and richness here. Materials include stone bare-faced concrete, and rendered concrete

2 Integration of retaining walls into buildings

Apatu: The buildings and walls tend to be entirely separate entities, creating a series of barriers – from road, over wall, to stark apatu facades.

Village: The walls are almost always a part of the village buildings, the use of materials give clues to where building begin and wall ends but they are very much a part of each other, as if one couldn’t exist without the other.

3 Hierarchy of circulation routes

Apatu: Main vehicular routes around the edges of the apartments are wide with narrow pathways, not inviting for pedestrians. The private streets within the residential developments are cut off from the public routes. The retaining walls cause a ’one-sidedness’ – public verses private are disconnected domains.

Village: The streets weave around following the contours of the steep hillside slope, widening and narrowing a various points. The main route up to the mountain beyond is wide with steps and a slope, secondary  smaller routes lead of this main path. 

An English historical comparison: The Ha-Ha Wall

In a very different context, a type of retaining wall is used to form an invisible barrier. Found on many historic estates, they are a devices designed to avoid obtrusive fencing so when the gentry used to look out to the horizon, they couldn’t see where their land ended and where the countryside began. Furthermore, they keep livestock out of private grounds. In 1712 Architect John James translates from Dezallier d'Argenville's La theorie et la pratique du jardinage (1709):

"Grills of iron are very necessary ornaments in the lines of walks, to extend the view, and to show the country to advantage. At present we frequently make thorough views, called Ah, Ah, which are openings in the walls, without grills, to the very level of the walks, with a large and deep ditch at the foot of them, lined on both sides to sustain the earth, and prevent the getting over; which surprises the eye upon coming near it, and makes one laugh, Ha! Ha! from where it takes its name. This sort of opening is haha, on some occasions, to be preferred, for that it does not at all interrupt the prospect, as the bars of a grill do."

There are hundreds of examples of these walls in England, mostly built in 17th and 18th centuries. They are rumored to have been introduced from France but also link strongly to Chinese gardening ideas of concealing barriers with nature.

Long sectional diagram: view from house over garden and beyond to the countryside

In comparison, a more contemporary example can be found at the Washington Monument. This ha-ha wall though is designed to minimize the visual impact of security measures after 9-11. The one-sided ha-ha is made of granite that reach deep enough into the ground and overlap at just the right points to stop an explosive-laden Humvee. The wall doubles as a seating bench and incorporates lighting. The secondary functions have similarities to the new cor-ten walls at Seonyudo Park.

Although the ha-ha walls are set in different context e.g. topography, density of construction and scale, it is useful to understand how retaining walls are used to control views. It highlights the importance of a visual connection with the landscape.

Workshop 1: project swap

Model-making in studio at KNUA, models from workshop

This workshop gave us the opportunity to discuss and make models of each of our projects. We chose names out of a hat and made a model which we felt expressed the chosen project. We swapped twice an had discussions at the end. I tried to work with an attitude of learning through making. I jotted down only a few notes to begin with and started making, knowing that my models were likely to alter and change as I made.

Clockwise from top left: My model of Tomi's project, my model of Beni's project,
Alpa's model of my project, Beni's model of my project

Firstly, I got Tommy’s project:
This model attempts to convey the peripheral conditions of the city. Urban mountain ranges overlap with natural mountain ranges, pushing and pulling the edges of the city. If looking here to place death (and celebrate and remember it), careful consideration of this situation is integral. Is a proposition placed next to a building, at the foot of the mountain, between city and landscape? How does it connect to the existing urban fabric?

Secondly, I got Beni’s:
Beni has mentioned that in Korean public spaces, there are often pockets of domesticity, which these models have tried to express. The first sectional model looks at how residential apartments and markets feel very disconnected in the city, and yet small areas of domestic living appear in the markets. Somehow, these pockets reveal more about life within the home than the Apatu buildings themselves. Secondly, the dark market alley shows a sequence of doors as if looking into life behind the façade of high-rise apartment blocks.

Models of my project:

Beni’s description of her model of my project:
‘The model tries to think about retaining walls spatially. Traditionally, piles of stones were used to form terraced landscapes: the rocks where placed on top of each other following the horizontal layering of the land. In contrast, modern walls are vertical elements that disrupt the landscape and hide the different strata of the ground. I tried to express this by covering with white paper the corrugated cardboard layers stacked on top of each other.
The direction of the circulation in relation to the wall can also be explored spatially. The ladders leaning on the walls try to illustrate the impossibility of climbing up the mountains due to the scale of retaining walls. In contrast, traditional villages, like Inwangsan, allow a more permeable circulation.’

Alpa’s description of her model of my project:
'Mountains can be considered as modulations in the horizontal plane - contour lines (a planar expression of a 3D phenomena) reinforce this reading.  The retaining walls are a strong vertical presence that impose a re-reading of the landscape.  Initially the mountains determined the position of the walls but in aggregate, the walls themselves begin to define the landscape.'

This has been a useful exercise, both in modeling other peoples’ projects and seeing what people make of my project. Points to take away:
- Traditional verses contemporary walls,: differences in construction and scales
- Integration verses separation of walls to buildings
- Impact on circulation from the location and orientation of the walls, permeability
- Horizontal verses vertical planes defining the landscape
- A new way of reading the landscape through city infrastructure

For images of all the models, see the most Seoul Satellite blogpost.

Inwangsan: Drawing the structure

Long sketch section showing changes in level (retaining walls in thick black)

After visiting Inwangsan for a second time, I have drawn a quick sketch plan remembering the structural objects along the journey i.e. retaining walls, steps and buildings.

Plan Diagram: Drawing the structure

It has been useful to visit this area but it is important now to identify positive aspects of the village in order to draw comparisons to the apatu street conditions. A few initial ideas:

- Materiality: there is more variation and similar materials to buildings are used for the wall construction e.g. such as stone, render, brickwork

- Integration into buildings: walls seem to be part of the village whereas in the new developments the walls appear as separate entities to the buildings

- Hierarchy of routes: wider and narrow paths open and close gradually through the village. On the other hand, the new developments tend to have very wide main roads with narrow paths and then private streets within the developments. There is less fluidity in the latter so the walls seem to create a barrier.

Seonyudo Ecological Park - a different retaining wall

This ecological park opened in 2002, four years after the former water treatment plant closed in 1998. Much of the structure of the original building has been retained making this one of the few sites in Seoul where twentieth century building is celebrated as ‘industrial heritage’.

Site plan of island showing four zone of park, corten walls highlighted in square block (see below)

The remaining crumbling concrete walls now retain water, the thick sunken drums have become amphitheatres and the old foundations have been exposed to create a courtyard. The layout of the former water plant now forms the routes through and backdrop for the park. As one walks through, it is like journeying through a process, of history and of ecology. The 100 square metre plot is divided into four zones:

1 Water Purification: converts former water purification basin into a series of  pools. Natural processes now clean the water. The water is channelled to the ecological water playground
2 Garden of Green Columns: Ivy-clad columns make up a sunken area, formerly the main reservoir’s foundation
3 Aquatic Botanical Garden: Shallow filtration basin, previously used to remove debris from water
4 Garden of Transition: Former chemical settlement facility now houses an aroma, vine, moss and fern gardens

The four zones are connected by paths, boardwalks and elevated walkways that run alongside a network of pipelines and water conduits

Retaining walls

This visit has introduced a new type of retaining wall:

- crumbling concrete walls that retain water as well as earth: a rich series of layers reveal the history of what existed before
- new walls made from corten steel (a material not used anywhere else that I have seen) create a generous entrance to the exhibition hall

I am interested also in to the two new retaining walls found at the park. The main entrance to the exhibition hall slopes down to a sub-basement level. In front of the foyer, two corten steel walls frame a generous processional ramp entrance as drawn below. At the higher level, the walls provide a bench seating area providing different uses with one element; retaining, seating, framing. These functions questions the role of retaining walls, what are their limits?

Section diagram

Axonometric

The Contract Signing

Contract: a guide map

Finally the big day arrived. We each gave a short presentation giving an overview of our contracts and they were all signed successfully! For the full document, see Contract.

Those present:
LMU: Robert Mull, Catrina Beevor, Stefanie Rhodes
KNUA: Haewon Shin, Christian Schweitser, Ryul Song
Free Unit London – via Sykpe
The Seoul Seven

Site visits: Day 2

As part of our group visits, as mentioned in the previous post, Alpa showed us a small alleyway near Jongno where many dignitaries used to pass. This small alleyway was built alongside the main road during the Joseon period for commoners to walk and not be seen.

I decided to take the group to Inwangsan mountain because this is place that I have felt most engaged with since arriving in Seoul. As explained in a previous blogpost, walking away from the retail street, and through older mid-rise residential buildings, apatu and finally the village, a series of layers begin to reveal themselves. We walked past several retaining walls and finally reached the small village. A Shamanist ceremony was taking place when we arrived consisting of the Shaman (female leader who connects spirits with earth) dancing and making eerie sounds, a whole dead pig and free rice cake for us.

I asked the group to draw something they could see which they felt related to my project:

Clockwise from top left: Jon, Catrina, Robert, Tomi, Rosa, Alpa, Beni

The sketches are mostly of tall retaining walls which guide the paths that weave their way around the village lanes and of rooftops seen as you look back over the village from above. It was interesting to see how others perceived the village. It would be useful to go back for a third time a draw just the walls which dictate the routes around the village.

L-r: Alleyway near Jongo - Alpa's visit, Namdaemun market - Beni's visit

For Beni’s site visit we went to Namdaemun market and ate noodles in a tightly packed noodle alley between two buildings. Rosa took us to Seoul Station, a popular area for the homeless to congregate. The following day, Amanda took us to a show apartment in a new residential development. It was interesting to see behind the one of the concrete facades and have a glimpse into what life might be like inside one of these apartments. The flat felt to me much like the equivalent in England, only more spacious and fully equipped with a Kimchi maker!

Site visits: Day 1

Robert and Catrina arrived last night and as part of their visit, we were each asked to choose a place of interest to take the group to.

View of cemetery: photograph and sketch

Tomi took us Seoul National Cemetery, a vast area located amongst the mountains to the south of the river Han. Between thousands of gravestone are small retaining walls, dealing with the topography sensitively.

For Jon’s visit, we went for coffee in a café along the river Han. Built on the floodplain, this café is designed to rise with the water level as it changes seasonally.

Underpass: Looking down, looking up

Afterwards we visited Haewon Shin’s (Lokaldesign) new underpass linking a busy road to the riverside. Here is another example of a retaining wall in Seoul. They're everywhere!...

The Lecture I missed

L-r: Tilt-up House and UN Residence by Himma Studio. Landscape informing architecture

Unfortunately I didn’t know about the subject of this lecture until afterwards. Given by Hailim Suh of Himma Studio, it explored the relationship of architecture and landscape, and how landscape can be used as a way to inform design in terms of space, form and programme. The practice also designed buildings for Paju Book City and Heyri Art Village. This is likely to be a useful reference later in the project.

Inwangsan: The issue of scale

The diagrammatic site plan and section illustrate the differences in building typology and how this translates to the issue of scale. The new Apatu developments totally disregard the scale of the existing urban fabric.

Inwangsan: Mountain revealing the layers of the edge of the city

From Inwangsan to Namsan: Apatu, city, mountains

A series of layers revealed themselves as I made my towards the mountain. Leaving a bustling shopping street, and walking through an older residential area, I could see the apatu looming behind. Past several retaining walls (they really are everywhere), it was a relief walking up the steep path towards a brightly decorated gateway. Behind is hidden a modest village nestled in the hillside of Inwangsan. Its imperfections, steep jagged lanes, terrible and beautiful buildings, and temples, just feel like they’re meant to be here.

In the village, looking down a steep slope (sketch and photo)

Standing at the back of the village, you can look back over the rooftops towards the modern blocks and mountains beyond. Walking further up around the mountain, past the shrines and the men and woman reciting verses in front of the statues, a true inhabitation of the landscape can be understood.

Regardless of religious beliefs, there is a soul to this place. It is one of the most significant sacred mountains in Seoul, serving as the most active center of Shamanism and folk-religious traditions. Guksadang, the most famous shamanist shrine is located here. The shrine was originally built on the Namsan but in 1925 Guksadang was demolished by the Japanese so Korean Shamanists secretly rebuilt it on Inwangsan In the 1970s the authorities designated the entire cluster of Shamanic shrines here and a single Buddhist temple called Inwangsa with its own single one pillar entrance gate and a central bell in a pavilion.

Sketch plans: Plan 01 (above) Plan 00 (below), photo of external stair

Lastly, this is a building I came across which begins to use the steep topography in a different way; turning roof into floorplate.

Contract Draft: Making the map

Why Seoul? Why Free?
The opportunity to study in Seoul was not to be missed. I am interested in cities and their contexts. Korea has recently emerged as a world city after a tumultuous past, something that intrigues me. After a month of living in Seoul, some preconceptions have been confirmed whilst others have been scrapped. An initial interest in the socio-political and historical context of the city naturally led onto the subject of the landscape here. This subject was touched on just before leaving London and has emerged as the central theme for the project since arriving.

Making the map: a test

The Contract
This document takes the form of a map book, something everyone needs to find their way around a new city. The idea is that the map will be added to throughout the year, culminating in a story of my process; where I’ve been, what I’ve seen, what I think, what others think.. The contract will be referred to repeatedly throughout the project. It highlights the interests, research and aims of the project. A copy for tutors and friends provides an overview, the hope being that they will be able to advise, support and hold me accountable to the following statements. Although there will inevitably be changes and deviations from this original contract, the core values and intentions must remain:

1 A project routed in a fascination for cities and their contexts

2 Landscape as the thread of research and exploration to form a proposition; how mountainous landscape influences the city and its people

3 Consideration of three moments where city meets landscape: city context, periphery / edge, and detail

4 The inclusion of the poetics and symbolism of landscape, not just physical but various manifestations of itself in the city

5 Provision of a place that enhances and celebrates city meeting landscape

The final contract signing will be on Wednesday 9th November. More to follow..