URBANTAINER

URBANTAINER is an architecture and design firm that creates unique atmospheres and spaces for subculture inhabitation within the city. Various social actions and behaviors are continuously taking place within the built urban environment. We seek this social activity and offer it a presence. Our designs are immediately inhabited by events for people to meet, interact, and enjoy. We give subculture a physical presence within the city. The urban condition in Asia is a complex vertical system of competition, architecturally and socially. We at URBANTAINER believe in a horizontal discovery and structuring of the urban environment; a social structure where unique communities can form and thrive. It is our philosophy to understand these communities and enhance them. Design does not only create physical beauty, but has the power to facilitate wellbeing and interaction. By using simple infrastructure that exists rampantly in urban Seoul, such as water tanks, shipping containers, and scaffolding, we juxtapose standardization and industry with underground culture. People are then allowed to understand the city like never before. We use urban infrastructure to facilitate meeting and fluid social interaction. During this process of social design, communication between subculture, the institution, and URBANTAINER is essential. We strive to progressively adhere to the existing subculture conditions in the city while designing architecture for pleasant social consumption.