In Korea, in the late '70s and early' 80s, boombox was a familiar sounding device that played radio and cassette tapes. When my school went on a picnic, some students brought a boombox, and we all shared loud music coming out of its speaker with classmates. Boombox reminds me of memories of cassette tapes with loose film in it and stimulates nostalgia at that time. They consumed popular culture in the midst of a rapid economic development in their teenage years, and received the same level of education as their contemporaries from other advanced countries. Now they became the main generation of the society that have family and raise children. Boombox House is a rental house project that targets this specific generation.
The location is a detached residential area of Chungmugong-dong, Jinju City. Chungmugong-dong is an innovative city newly created by the relocation of LH (Korea Land and Housing Corporation). In this area, which is actively equipped with urban infrastructures until now, apartment houses rapidly came in first, and single houses are also coming in one by one. The site is a typical single residence in any planned city, but it is located at the corner of the road, so it has a fan shape, not a rectangular shape. So, we started to use this original differentiation of the land as a design element to emphasize its form.
It is a rental house that presupposes popularity and universality, but it is necessary to have the speciality that is appropriate for the target which shares the sensitivity of a certain generation. Attempts to escape the familiarity of the original without a great deviation were also an interesting task given to the architect. The planned duplex house was an inevitable choice to increase the profitability of the building owner while at the same time being a safeguard to ease the awkwardness of a detached house to a generation familiar with the apartment. And, A and B houses were designed not in a simple symmetry but in different ways, so that residents could choose a space that suits their individuality and preference.
'A' house has a courtyard and a living room on the first floor. The interior wall of the living room has a look with exterior brick finish extended to the room. It is different from the general method of stacking bricks by stacking bricks every other layer with twist looking, omitting vertical construction joints. Opening the living room window leads to the courtyard where there is a open area in which indoor is extended to outdoor. This place was occupied by a couple in their mid-30s with a 4-year-old child. House B has a living room with exposed concrete walls on the second floor, and a staircase that goes up to the third floor extends to the rooftop courtyard. In the private roof-top yard, various activities are available to suit the resident's preferences. This place was also occupied by a late 30s couple with two children aged 7 and 5 years old. A house has a ground floor facing the ground, and house B has a rooftop garden facing the sky. I imagine, someday, the two neighbors will be sharing their own yards each other. This part of the design was intentionally planned, so it is an ideal figure that can be fully predicted.
Boombox House is located in a new city that has not been completely filled and waiting to be connected and communicate with neighbors. The main mass of the building with the highlighted front round gives the effect that it looks bigger than the actual scale. To give lightness to this appearance, we twisted the mass that opens up and down and brought it out. Although bricks are used as exterior materials, there is no monotony in the conventional way, and it is in a hetero typical form, but it is not showy. I hope that the boombox house where comfort and color difference are confronted will be a new but familiar house in the innovative city of Jinju.
