Opened in March, Zaha Hadid’s Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) serves as a cultural hub at the centre of Dongdaemun, a historic district in Seoul that is now renowned for its 24-hour shopping and cafes.

The range of public spaces within DDP includes exhibition halls, convention halls, a design museum, lab and archives, a children’s education centre, media centre, seminar rooms and a sky lounge.

DDP is a fluid architectural landscape that revolves around the ancient city wall and cultural artefacts discovered during archaeological excavations preceding DDP’s construction. These historic features form the central element of project’s composition, linking the DDP park, plaza and city together.

The architects says that the design is the specific result of how the context, local culture, programmatic requirements and innovative engineering come together – allowing the architecture, city and landscape to combine in both form and spatial experience – creating a whole new civic space for the city.

The building’s shapely facade is made up of 45,000 aluminium panels of varying sizes and curvatures. This was achieved using advanced 3-dimensional digital construction services, making DDP is the first public building in Korea to make use of this technology.

The DDP park offers a new green oasis within the busy urban surroundings of Dongdaemun. The design integrates the park and plaza as one, blurring the boundary between architecture and nature in a continuous, fluid landscape. Voids in the park’s surface offer visitors glimpses into the innovative world of design below.

DDP opened to the public on 21 March. It will be hosting five separate design and art exhibitions featuring works by modern designers, as well as the prized collection of traditional Korean art of the Kansong Art Museum.

Zaha Hadid Architects
zaha-hadid.com