URBAN TAPESTRY, Spatial interventions with colonial architecture, Gunsan, South Korea

Abstract

This thesis presents a design proposal for new interventions in the vernacular fabric of the former colonial quarter of Gunsan, South Korea. To frame this proposal, the thesis discusses the interpretation of “colonialism” in the built environment considering how architecture can serve both as evidence and as a narrative historical change. During the Japanese colonial era, from 1910 to 1945, Gunsan was one of the country's major ports. Under the Japanese, Gunsan underwent a major urban transformation, taking on the gridded master plan that is still in use today. To this day, the grid pattern of the city survives, even as new urban layers have been stacked upon those of the past. In recent years, to address cultural tourism for educational purposes, preservation has focused on the Japanese colonial period with the aim to boost Gunsan’s tourist economy. In contrast, the thesis argues that an architectural approach to the colonial architecture of Gunsan must confront the city’s controversial past through an appropriate design strategy of weaving and stitching, as opposed to erasing the past or wholly preserving it. This thesis also considers how to intervene the neighborhood in an incremental way to serve the residents in the neighborhood rather than displacing them in favor of serving the global tourist economy. Therefore, this thesis project suggests an approach to address the overlooked vernacular colonial architecture. The design proposal shows how a modern intervention can be made that is compatible in scale but nonetheless modern in terms of materials and architectural design. The underlying order of the colonial urban pattern provides the basis for an architectural "kit of parts," allowing the intervention to merge incrementally into the neighborhood to provide small-scale spaces and programs to support the local people of the Gunsan community. The underlying order of the colonial period and the architectural colonial period is not imitated, but rather its fabric informs the proposed intervention, fitting appropriately while showing change and representing the present-day in contrast to the past.