Photographer: Jinbo Choi | ArchDaily

Meomum Zip House / Todot Architects and Partners

Miwa Negoro — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 19:00:00 +0000

A request came in for a house on a high piece of land, deep in a forest. The location was a place called Sudaewool in Munho-ri, SeoJong-myeon, consisting of two plots designated as a residential development complex. The clients were a couple who run a mid-sized company, and the house was intended to be a retreat for the couple and their employees. For the couple, it would serve as a weekend home; for the employees, it would function as a "stay"—a place to stop by and rest for a while.

Raw House / Todot Architects and Partners

Hana Abdel — Fri, 17 May 2024 06:00:00 +0000

The site is located on the mountainside with a view of the ridge in the distance, and the mountain terrain in the front with the sun behind gives off a bright and colorful light that allows people to feel nature intact. The first thought the design team had when looking at the site was what the attitude of accepting nature as it is without damaging it would be, the attitude of living in nature, and what the architecture reflecting them would look like. The height difference of the site was more than two stories, and it accesses the road at the higher side, but the flat ground suitable for building a house was small. The site was barely big enough for a yard, and it was a hill.

Round Roofs Residence / Todot Architects and Partners

Hana Abdel — Fri, 26 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Round Sky and Angular Ground - The phrase, “The sky is round and the ground is angular.” is an old-saying found in the Chinese astronomic book, Zhou bi suan jing. Ancient Fareast Asians acknowledged the boundary between the sky and buildings as curves. For that reason, traditional Korean buildings have distinctively curved roof lines. We took a philosophical approach in terms of designing buildings rather than the curved form itself.

Giyeon-ga Mixed-Use Building / Todot Architects and Partners

Pilar Caballero — Sat, 20 Jan 2024 23:00:00 +0000

The site facing the Seojong district road is narrow and gets wider as one gets deeper. The narrow side of the site is a weakness for a commercial purpose. Fortunately, vehicles rather than pedestrians are predominant in the neighborhood so we imagined a variety of images provided by the project as vehicles pass by. It displays different impressions from different angles of the road, and, at the same time, flexible curvature attracts the view deep into the site. The surface of the façade is sometimes smooth, sometimes rough, and sometimes bumpy, with a tambour profile. Even the smooth façade transitions into a series of louver columns, which control and alleviate daylight transmits to the indoors. We hoped that such an unconventional volume of the building would promote unexpected interactions within the site.

Dong Baek Wooden House / mlnp architects

Hana Abdel — Sun, 14 Jan 2024 17:00:00 +0000

Dongbaek Wooden House is located in a residential area developed under the concept of a townhouse in the early days of Korea called Hyangrin Hill in Yongin-si. The land is a condition with a somewhat stepped view and scent open to the south. Since it is a natural green area, despite the area of large land, the floor area of the house that can meet the needs of the owner is not sufficient. The Dongbaek Wooden House tried to fully utilize the structural and material properties of the heavy timber structure.

Mangmi Farm / Todot Architects and Partners

Hana Abdel — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 05:00:00 +0000

The project is located in Mangmi Village in Yangpyeong, South Korea, in the valley where three mountains meet. Sitting in the deep mountains, the site retains a calm, peaceful vibrance. After retirement, the client couple have been living there growing fruit trees. They asked for a community facility and a glasshouse along with a campsite. The most important feature of the site is the forest. Trees rooted down there for a long time have memories of the place more than anything.

Mom’s Garden Center / Todot Architects and Partners

Hadir Al Koshta — Sun, 02 Jul 2023 23:00:00 +0000

Even though the site is situated in a suburb, is a more populated area than the surrounding neighborhoods. A train station, apartments, a market, and schools are located nearby. “Mom’s Garden” is sitting on the outskirts of the town center where single-story shops are scattered along the three-lane road, creating a tranquil street scene.

YN241 Mixed Use Building / skimA

Hana Abdel — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 21:00:00 +0000

Yeonnam-dong used to be a low-rise residential area, but in recent years, remodeling into cafes and restaurants has accelerated, centering on the Gyeongui Line Forest Road, called 'Yeontral Park'. The site of YN241 faces the Gyeongui-Jungang Line railroad at the end of Yeonnam-dong and is located in front of the Yeonhui Underpass that goes to Yeonhui-dong.

Y2 Mixed Use Building / DAAL

Andreas Luco — Wed, 07 Dec 2022 18:00:00 +0000

The changing residential landscape - Yeonhui-dong is a representative high-class residential area in Seoul. Currently, with the expansion of the commercial areas of Sinchon and Hongdae, lively commercial spaces are formed in calm residential areas, changing the existing atmosphere. The Y2 building is in a residential area formed on a hill off the main road. The area is an enclosed residential area surrounded by high walls and walls along the slope. However, the fact that the site is a corner of a slope was an advantage because the building could be recognized from the entrance of the alley. It was decided that if the building is actively incorporated with elements that can serve as a good face, it can have charm and attention that will attract people from the alleys.

Yeoju House / Todot Architects and Partners

Hana Abdel — Sun, 14 Aug 2022 23:00:00 +0000

One day, an elderly couple visited us to build a house on a peaceful land in Yeoju where a king’s tomb can be seen in the distance. For as long as one year since deciding to build a new house after their retirement, they organized and listed up their humble wishes which an architect has to carefully consider. It took quite a long time to approach the design considering the spirituality, the warmth, and the truthfulness they showed us. The approach was more careful because both the client and we were well aware that merely a functional house is not an objective in the project.

Jin-Hwa Mountain Cottage / Todot Architects & Partners

Bianca Valentina Roșescu — Sun, 29 May 2022 06:00:00 +0000

The couple who loves Yangsu-ri where we reside used to visit the eco-park with their dog whenever time allowed. After strolling through the park, they would occasionally stop by our office for a cup of coffee. They always said that they wanted to build a house and live in Yangsu-ri and sometimes talked about their hometown in Ulsan where their ancestral mountain is located. We never knew they would finally have a house on that mountain. “Jin-Hwa Mountain Cottage” was the name of the project the client carefully came up with and the name clearly showed their intention. In Mountain Cottage, we read the client’s wish that the house be humble. In Jin-Hwa which is a combination of one syllable from each of his parents’ names, we read his desire to rejuvenate his childhood memory with his parents.

11 Terrace Office Building / OA-Lab

Bianca Valentina Roșescu — Tue, 17 May 2022 20:00:00 +0000

“11 Terrace” is an office building project located amid a congested neighborhood with offices, housing and retails in Samsung-dong, Seoul. In this development-oriented neighborhood, nature has often been pushed off priority amid rapid urbanization. Nature and public spaces are alienated, and buildings’ ground floors are dominated by parking spaces without care for the public and pedestrians. In this context, commercial office buildings become tall boxes with no outdoor interactions as developers try to maximize their floor areas.

Curtain Call Apartments / Todot Architects and Partners

chlsey — Sun, 28 Nov 2021 23:00:00 +0000

The White Curtain Reveals Its Presence in the City. The site is surrounded by neighboring buildings on three sides and only one side is revealed towards the road. We designed a building that reveals its presence as a white curtain in the urban setting. Within the building, a café and multi-family housing coexist, and inevitably, hierarchy of lessor and lessee is created. By incorporating a white-curtain-like façade, we tried to alleviate the spatial and visual hierarchies to express a welcoming gesture to visitors and residents.

Gangil 119 Fire Station / OA-Lab

Hana Abdel — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 22:00:00 +0000

From vehicle-centric to people-centric - The “Gangil 119 Fire station” is a new fire station located in the Gangil area, a newly developed area following the Seoul Metropolitan City(SMC)’s urban design district plan at the southeastern periphery of the city. We approached the design by focusing on the question of what role the fire station should play in contemporary times. After studying existing fire stations built in Seoul under the same building regulations and programs, we proposed a fire station that focuses on the quality of firefighters’ working and living conditions. During the last several decades, it is dominant in the design process for fire stations that a garage to contain a large volume of fire engines becomes the center of the design compositions, thus spaces for firefighters such as offices and standby rooms are treated as periphery functions. Our goal was how to overcome the typical types, by reframing the fire station as a building for people while keeping its fundamental operations run well.

Book Strolling House / Todot Architects and Partners

Hana Abdel — Tue, 03 Aug 2021 20:00:00 +0000

The client wanted to build a house for his family, a bookstore and a guesthouse as a spiritual shelter for the urban kids on a scenic site with Pyeongtaek Lake, as the background, filled with Pampas grass. It seemed like the client who used to run a cram school, felt disgusted with the way he was pushing the young people to the battlefield and always thought that he was getting worn out. Consoled and rewarded by reading books with kids, he decided to realize his dream with us to wrap up the competitive urban life, work on more meaningful things and live healthy.

Sungin Space / Space Matter

Andreas Luco — Wed, 28 Oct 2020 20:00:00 +0000

Back ground. Sungin 1-dong is an old district situated next to a brand new, high-rise apartment complex. As a result, this creates enormous contrast between the residential environment and the landscape by the apartment wall forming a border line. Residents of the apartments live a comfortable life fenced off from the surrounding neighborhood. The apartments contain all the facilities and services, or social infrastructure, that they need to live their lives.

Soha House / Wonder Architects + NEEDS Architects

Pilar Caballero — Tue, 07 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

From the first inception, this small house project is conceived to have its own meaning in itself through its own architectural form which is mainly considered by following three terms.