David Chipperfield Architects completed the Amorepacific headquarters, Korea’s largest beauty company in the centre of Seoul. The project has been guided by the company’s will to engage with the city: Amorepacific headquarters can be therefore defined as a gradient of spaces spanning from a large atrium at the ground floor – conceived as a catalyst for cultural activities open to the city – and ending with the spaces for the company’s activities at the upper floors. As DCA states: “Buildings of this scale have a public responsibility that needs to be addressed by offering a public destination beyond formal appearance.”

The site has been occupied by the company since 1956 and is located in the Yongsan district, close to a park and a business district. The area, formerly a US military zone, is currently the largest high-rise development in Korea. The building weaves a complex program in its 216.000 sqm, distributed in 23 floors. The public facilities at the lowest floors include large atrium and exhibition space, an auditorium, a conference centre, a library, a retail area, restaurants area as well as the Amorepacific Museum of Art. At the upper floors, the offices of the company are flanked a day-care centre and a company history space and staff facilities such as gastronomy and fitness areas. The compact volume of Amorepacific headquarters is excavated by a central courtyard, three urban-scale openings and hanging gardens offered to the company’s staff as recreational spaces; this arrangement is effective in optimising daylight and natural ventilation.

The facade of the building is a lightweight envelope, as a diaphanous textile curtain made of matt-white aluminium fins of different sizes working as a shading device. David Chipperfield Architects designed four different solutions for the arrangement of the fins, that are placed on the facade according to solar exposure. Behind this layer, a thermal skin of fixed glazing and opaque ventilation panels is placed to improve thermal comfort. The external surface is elevated above the entrance level as a sign of the openness towards the city.