The deliberate use of hand drawing techniques with physical materials expands tactile sensibility and increases dexterity. It also allows the drawing to explore indeterminacy during the design process and investigate design options and directions more freely and intuitively. The drawing becomes a critical tool for thinking, making design decisions, and articulating the final design while embracing a digital mode of representation and evolving into a hybrid drawing. It builds generative and descriptive potentials throughout the design process and becomes a single multi-layered composite drawing required for the design-build project.
The story behind_
The name of the eldest hen my mother has been raising is Miracle.
My mother decided to raise hens in the corner of her garden. She had experience raising them and said they were pretty and friendly as dogs, and it was so wonderful getting healthy eggs every day. Getting chicks was not a difficult task. My brother-in-law picked seven chicks from his farm and had my nephew deliver them to us. I built a chicken coop in half a day on the same day the chicks arrived, using typical coop nets and metal pipes. My mother was happy to see the little chicks soon to be grown up and laying eggs. But raising chicks was not going smoothly. Not too long after, there was an attack by presumably stray dogs. There was a big torn hole in the net. Five chicks were left dead. Luckily, the two chicks escaped to the garden and were alive. My mother and I fixed the coop and covered up the bottom part so it would be hard for predators to tear the net. We thought this would protect the chicks even though it could not be perfect. My aunt said the coop looked empty and bought four chicks to fill it up, so six were living in it. For a while, chicks were growing well peacefully, but there was another attack by some animals that dug the ground. And this time again, only two survived. We felt heartbroken. My mother talked about giving up raising hens. But we fixed the coop once more and reinforced it this time. It looked sturdy, and we hoped there would be no more attacks. The surviving chicks grew well for some time, and one started laying eggs. But there was another attack. It was so heartbreaking. One of the chicks was left bitten to death outside the coop, and the other, hard to imagine how she survived, was putting her head down at the corner, looking still terrified by the attack with all the tale feathers gone.
As an architect, I was determined to build a real coop. I delved into the habits of chickens, researched ways to design a space that would ensure their happiness, and sought inspiration from well-designed chicken coops. The design of the new chicken coop was developed by considering numerous elements, and I completed the construction with the help of my uncle and his friend. My mother named the young hen who survived three harsh attacks and got to live in the new coop Miracle(Ki Jeok). The new miraculous space for Miracle was finally complete. She looked so happy moving into her new home. I felt both sorrow for being unable to protect her from the attacks and satisfaction at creating a worry-free coop. My mother bought five chicks to fill the new space, creating a new family for Miracle(Ki Jeok) and naming each.
Through designing and building the coop, I reaccessed the human-centered perception that architecture is an activity only for living and habitation of human beings. And I realized that, in architecture, fundamental opportunity and genuine intent are more important than professional knowledge and technique. More than two millennia ago, Roman architect Vitruvius wrote that the three elements that good architecture must have were stability, utility, and beauty in The Ten Books on Architecture, and this has been considered the truth until today. However, beyond fulfilling these principles, this experience of designing and building the coop offered me a chance to reaffirm that architecture can create new values and play an important role in searching for meaning in life.
This experience with the hens was a powerful reminder of the importance of gratitude. In our busy lives, we often overlook the miracles of our ordinary days and the health and safety we enjoy. This little journey with the hens reinforced the need to be always grateful for these blessings. It's a simple truth that gratitude attracts miracles, and this lesson resonates deeply with me.
Location: Yangju, South Korea
Year: 2023
Type: non-human housing
Area: 7.68㎡
Structure: light wood frame
Material: wood, galvanized corrugated sheets, metal pipe, brick, concrete masonry units (Drawing-Graphite on Korean paper, digital print overlay, 24x18 in.)
