Year: 2019
Type: Architecture (hotel)
Location: Jeju-do, Korea
Design Team: Jae K. Kim, Sookran Kwak, Young June Lee
The main focus of this project was aimed to design an architecture that successfully demonstrates the ability of additive manufacturing technology of the client’s company. The client wanted to exhibit their ability in the production of high-quality additive manufactured parts and at the same time, adapt to the local context and novelty in design to appeal to the visiting tourists and the city councils. The local rocks common in Jeju-do island called basalt was selected as a starting motive for the design due to its unique characteristic and potential to further explorer the novel design, which meets the client’s requirements.
The design motive is derivative from the basalt, which is a commonly found rock in the local area. In specific conditions, this rock shows a unique geometric characteristic called columnar joint or columnar basalt, which is formed by rapidly cooled lava. The columnar basalt presents various distortion due to gravity. We focused on potential of these intriguing patterns found in natural minerals. Self-resemblance and geometric complexity of minerals are hard to replicate by conventional method, but still can be found, for example, in ornaments of Gothic churches. By adopting these natural patterns, we explored ornamentation in multiple scales utilizing the additive manufacturing method.
