The work aspired to perpetuate the climatic condition propitious to progressive movements for a free and just society

Perpetual erpetual Spring, The Climate-Correcting Machine, a project commissioned by the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Seoul, located in the heart of downtown Seoul, has received the Architecture MasterPrize™ (AMP) honoring international designs in various disciplines of architecture. Perpetual Spring, designed by Obra Architects, was recognized as Best of Best in the Exhibition category, as well as in the Public Space category. 

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Opened to the public in September 2020, the Perpetual Spring pavilion served as a featured work in the centennial exhibition “Architecture and Heritage: Unearthing Future”, aiming to connect outdoor spaces at the heart of the city’s center and to provide a platform for commissioned architects to reflect upon Seoul’s modern heritage, while highlighting issues facing urban life in today's world and its future. The Perpetual Spring pavilion project is a demonstration, and a chance to focus public attention on issues of the city, climate change, the environment, and the future. Designed to be on display and in use in the public courtyard of one of the most-frequented and visible institutions in the city of Seoul, its placement positioned the project for the widest reach and greatest social impact of its message.

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Founded on the idea that creating a true space of free public expression is already a radical way of questioning the ways in which the city is reproduced and expanded today, the “Climate-Correcting Machine” presented both a platform for awareness and an invitation to action. By maintaining spring weather inside the pavilion, the work aspired to perpetuate the climatic condition propitious to progressive movements for a free and just society; spring has become a poetic expression in human history as referred to in the Spring of Nations, the Prague Spring, the Arab Spring, etc.

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

The Perpetual Spring Pavilion served as a one-of-a-kind prototype showcasing the functional aspects of urban community gathering: a building as an artificially-controlled greenhouse machine to address and bring attention to a pressing global issue of our time: climate change. Combining form and destination with function, the Pavilion was proposed as a “climate-correcting machine,” both a platform for awareness and an invitation to action.

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

As if it were the head of some giant insect, the Perpetual Spring Pavilion will be outfitted with 150 “eyes,” each a 90-cm diameter polycarbonate plastic semi-sphere. These crystalline luminous “eyes” bulge out of the pavilion’s otherwise dull metallic mass as if compelled to expand by an overwhelmingly strong internal force. Ambiguously, they separate interior and exterior, while generously allowing into the space the sunshine that contributed towards keeping the space warm during the cold days of fall and winter. Adding the equipment necessary for the assemblage of an artificial climate-correcting machine, the Pavilion was outfitted with a variable climate control system including photovoltaic panels on the museum’s nearby roof. These panels powered automatic exhaust fans, aluminum foil curtains and a phase-change radiant floor-heating system in order to stabilize and balance temperatures inside the space and preserve permanent spring weather-like conditions with a small garden growing inside the Pavilion.

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

Photo credit: Obra Architects

About Obra Architects

Obra Architects is an architectural design and planning firm working on projects of urban and community impact that create socially sustainable design environments. Work includes housing prototypes, public space initiatives, urban planning, aging-in-place residential projects, educational projects such as schools and kindergartens, and incorporation of energy efficiency and renewable energy alternatives in design and project execution, with LEED AP professional staff and FAIA Fellow of the American Institute of Architects principal leadership. Obra is a minority woman-owned business enterprise, supporting local and international community-minded clients and institutional level initiatives in work and practice, with projects all over the world, including Argentina, China, Korea, Italy, and the US. The firm is actively entrepreneurial and operates to try to change the way architecture impacts communities and environments. At the same time, the work aims to originate from a pragmatism and realism that harnesses local energies and international inspired clients / institutions seeking change through architecture, design, and urban planning.