Interview about Wave Residential House, winner of the A' Interior Space, Retail and Exhibition Design Award 2023
The Wave is a single detached house that blends seamlessly with its natural surroundings. It is designed to create a personalized living experience that caters to the needs of its residents. Every aspect of the design is carefully curated to provide a sensory experience that enhances the quality of life of its occupants. The living and bar areas are designed to combine solitude and communal space to create an atmosphere that is for entertainment. The high ceilings and large windows allow natural light to flood in, creating a warm and inviting ambiance that promotes relaxation and comfort.
View detailed images, specifications, and award details on A' Design Award & Competition website.
View Design DetailsThe Wave House project is a unique case that started with an interior design based on the concept of a view, and expanded the design scope to include the landscaping design, which is the subject of the view, as well as the front yard and wall connected to the building, and the landing part of the garden stairs. We tried to understand the formativeness and principles of architecture, and focused on naturally connecting this to the interior. In addition, we considered the front yard as the middle area in the relationship between the building and the landscape, and interpreted it as the concept of an outdoor living room that is connected to the same level as the interior. In this outdoor living room, users can experience devices that contain natural objects such as water and fire with artificial structures such as a mirror pond and a fire place, and furthermore, we planned it in stages so that they can experience a rest closer to nature in the pergola, which is located in a small forest of grass and trees.
In the process of understanding the structure of the building, we first interpreted the structure of the ceiling of the guest bathroom in the basement and its relationship with the outside. In order to make the experience of this guest bathroom that guests will use more impressive, we suggested to the architect to dramatically increase the ceiling height and put a skylight here. As a result, the natural light coming down through the small skylight created by opening the ceiling slab conveys the change to the user, leading to a considerate and impressive experience for the user, and at the same time, the user can have an enhanced and special experience of this house.
It can be said that it is closely related to the lifestyle of the members of this house. Family members of different ages should be able to eat together and spend leisure time separately, and each person needs different experiences in the same space. To satisfy this, we set up various scenarios for movement and behavior, and focused on hiding advanced functions as much as possible. The materials used in the building were fully revealed in the interior, and the sculptural language of the building was continued into the interior to emphasize consistency. On the other hand, the interior design was planned to highlight the nature seen through the window, and the style of the interior design tried to appropriately convey the physical properties of the materials.
The original plan did not have the concept of a front yard in front of the building as it is now. We reviewed the ratio of the land and the building area and thought about the experience between the indoor and outdoor lawn. We set up a process so that users can enjoy the mirror pond indoors while being blocked from the outside and experience the light scattered in the pond at the same time, or go out and experience the water directly with natural elements such as grass and trees. For the garden stairs, we proposed a new design for the landing part and wall of the stairs designed by the architect to create a dramatic transition between the nature that users experience in the moving section and the artificial elements through the finishing materials. At the same time, the heavy stone finish on the wall of the stairs leading up to the garden was designed to make users using the cantilevered stairs feel psychologically stable. Through this experience, we wanted to connect users with nature in their daily lives.
We were able to reduce the gap between the design and the actual implementation through simulation. By confirming the results of the simulation and the application dimensions of the actual scale on site, we were also able to narrow the gap between the plan and the user experience. By repeating the work of confirming various materials related to the design derived from this technology with actual samples, we were able to effectively implement various scenes intended in the planning process, and through technical collaboration with partners, we were able to effectively hide the hardware.
The difficulty in configuring the fireplace of the Wave House can be said to be the difference in level between the dining and living spaces. For example, on the dining side, the height of the fireplace is close to the floor, and on the living room side, the height had to be considered appropriate when sitting on the sofa. At the same time, the opening at the bottom was designed to be experienced visually and functionally from both sides by setting the area as a natural material called fire. In addition, the hanging part was finished with a book-matching finish of large marble tiles that match the volume of the space, so that it functions as an object at the boundary between the kitchen and living room.
We decided on the interior and landscape design based on the user's psychological experience according to the orientation of the building and the positional relationship of the windows. As a representative example, in the case of the staircase in this house, the user inevitably experiences going up and down in their daily lives, so we proposed changing the design of the concrete stairs in the existing building plan to a steel-structured floating type staircase to bring in the southeast-facing natural light. As a result, we were able to develop it to what it is now through collaboration with architecture and structure. Through this, the user can experience natural light coming in through the stairs that are not dark, and at night, the pendant lighting in the void space creates a completely different atmosphere from the daytime.
This book-matching hanging wall has two roles in the space. First, it is a type of function as a boundary between the open kitchen and living room. Second, it is a visual role as a focal point in the space on both sides. We thought of an image that is processed but natural and symbolic at the same time, and thought about a boundary that is closed but open. At the same time, the final result is a boundary derived from an organic natural object like fire.
It took about 5 months for the first design simulation to come out. We started with interior design for a total of nearly 2 years during the construction period, and we developed the design without any boundaries, focusing on the user experience, from the architectural parts such as the indoor and outdoor stairs to the landscaping and outdoor design. Through this, we were able to harmoniously connect each boundary between architecture, landscaping, and interior, and through this, we ultimately aimed to connect users and nature more closely.
Considering the repetitive actions that occur in daily life in the home, this is not a trend, but rather affects the quality of the user's experience and the efficiency of household labor. For example, a device that allows even a child to easily and safely open a 3.6m high, thick front door using a high-performance hinge, or a device that dramatically exposes the outside scenery by opening the blinds in a large room at once, improves the living experience by making it easier for the user to use the space and experience nature more closely.
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