Draft Thesis Statement

1. What are you going to do?

I am going to renovate the interior and partial exterior of a Korean traditional home in Seoul, Korea.
I want to study the different spatial elements of Korean architecture and explore how to integrate these features with western architecture to create a convenient space that can accommodate to a modern lifestyle.

2. Why are you doing it? What questions are you trying to answer?

I feel like all the big architects who are doing "big work" internationally all have this similar style of futuristic, blob, edgy amorphous architecture that wows people at first, but seeing it repetitively makes me crave to return to just simple beautiful architecture. Korea, a country with only 60 years of history of autonomy, the pace of industrialization has been faster than most currently established metropolis' around the world, and this unfortunate race for urbanization has lead governments to either put less emphasis on the preservation of the old or demolish most historical establishments. This quick pace of development is also often referred to as the 'miracle of the Han River.' Star-chitects are commissioned to do most of the public works in Seoul and for studying architects like I, there is really no established Korean architect to look up to. (digression) Anyways as Seoul keeps striving to compete with other cities, it seems to forget that urbanization doesn't necessarily mean the destruction of the old and construction of the brand new, there has to be a harmonious way of growing the city with its past and the future.

There is a slow movement of bringing back Korean architecture to this city. I will only be renovating a small house, but this study will be a window that can lead me to bigger ideas of how this city should be develeop in order to maintain a healthy balance between the past and future.

3. How are you going to do it? What methods.

The interior of the house will be almost completely renovated. The two places: kitchen and bathroom will need to be the most "westernized" due to convenience. The rest of the house will emphasize the combination of Korean and modern components of living.
The utilization of the ground and the intermediate space between indoors and outdoors will be importantly dealt with.

4. What are you going to learn about? Area of research and source of material?

First, I will study traditional Korean architecture as well as look into other Asian architecture to distinguish the most important elements that determine our traditional style.
Then I will look at couple renovation work done with traditional architecture. This could be examples not just limited to Asian architecture but of all culmination of old and new.
Afterwards, I will study the trend in the current architecture market, and choose a(n) element(s) that I am interested in exploring to apply to this project.

5. Why is it important?

This thesis is important to me because it will offer an opportunity for me to fill in the part of education that I feel is absent in my studies. Even though I might not want to further explore traditional architecture in the future, it is important to know the architecture that is relevant to my origin.