Swiss Embassy in Seoul
South Korea
Photo © Hélène Binet
The project of the new embassy, which is located near one of Seoul’s imperial palaces and surrounded by high-rise apartment buildings, draws its inspiration from the traditional Korean courtyard houses, the Hanok. The embassy develops like a spiral around an intimate courtyard towards which the spacious receiving rooms are oriented. An expressive timber-frame gabled roof crowns the building. The construction is characterized by its exposed concrete exterior facades; their mineral, solid appearance is emphasized by an array of orthogonal ribs. The inner facades, made of wood and glass, adopt a more inward-looking character, and highlight the courtyard as a central, sheltered space.
Photo © Hélène Binet
Photo © Hélène Binet
- Engineers
- INGENI
- Year
- 2018
- Project Status
- Built
Related Projects
Magazine
-
Building of the WeekWithin Old Walls, a Breath of Fresh Air
Reichel Schlaier Architekten | 18.05.2026 -
Periphery as Method: On Architecture’s 'Dispositional Intelligence'
Guiomar Martín | 15.05.2026 -
