“Earth house”. To honor the Korean poet, constructed on the grounds of Seoul, Korea, this house was named as “Earth House”. The project was created by digging out a great amount of earth, enough space for a small residential area and two courtyards. The earth is bordered by concrete walls with pieces of the pine tree from the site implanted in it.
Since the Korean poet wrote about the sky, the earth and the stars, the architect decided to focus on the primal relationship between human beings and nature. The project is said to be constructed with ‘careful consideration of constructional efficiency’.
However, I wonder how does digging out a huge chunk of soil to create a house defines ‘constructional efficiency’. Plus how does the removal of Earth to construct a house an “Earth House”. Honestly, it is more of an ‘Unnecessary Excavation House’. Was this design really needed to remove that much Earth? I understand the architect’s position of wanting to create ‘a relationship between the Earth and humans, but he could have done it in an alternative way.
Architects are ones who are changing the cycle of nature. We must be aware of the design when we build something like this.
“Do we really have to design it in this way?”