History

1. 2010 ~ Now
   • 2022. 08 Established Overseas Corporation of Georgia, USA
     
   • 2020. 03 Established Overseas Corporation of Saudi Arabia
     
   • 2019. 05 Midsize Business Certificate
     
   • 2018. 09 Established Branch Office of Vietnam
     
   • 2015. 10 Licensed as Engineering Firm
     Certified as Firefighting Facility Design Firm
     
   • 2015. 02 Certified as Firefighting Construction Supervision Firm
     
   • 2014. 05 Established Branch Office of Iraq
     
   • 2013. 04 Launched Affiliate Company: HTECH Architecture
     Certification Amended to Comprehensive
     Construction Administration
     
   • 2013. 03 Certification Amended to Electric Technology
     Construction Administration
   • 2011. 05 Strategic alliance with H Architecture
2. 2001 ~ 2009
   • 2009. 03 Certified as Electric Technology Construction
     Administration Firm
   • 2006. 09 Established H Associates in New York, USA
   • 2006. 03 Licensed as Overseas Construction Business Firm
   • 2005. 12 Appointed as Substitute Military Service
     Certificate Firm
     
   • 2003. 12 Established Affiliated Research Institute
3. 1994 ~ 2000
   • 2000. 07 Certified as Construction Administration
     Company
   • 1994. 05 Incorporated HAEAHN Architecture, Inc.
4. 1990 ~ 1993
   • 1991. 08 Licensed as Professional Architectural Firm
   • 1990. 12 Started as HAEAHN Architects

Pioneering the Prototype of Korean Mixed-use Residential Buildings

The residence-driven mixed-use typology emerged with an ideal of ‘Live-Work proximity’ in pursuit of a time-saving lifestyle with 24/7 convenience in urban locations. Often developed within dense urban context, this typology naturally seeks extraordinary convenience and values. As a city evolves further, it transforms itself from a conventional residential-focused character to a more commercialized, high-end residential/retail mixed use dynamic.

“Mapo Hanhwa Obelisk” was introduced as an early model focusing largely on a high standard of convenience. Small residential units, community-building retail programs, and business-centered live-work complexes were integrated to suit the market characteristics of the area, and further differentiated with unique plan layouts by maximizing the open view toward the Han River. “Trump WorldⅠ”, built in the high-density Yeoido CBD area, evolved as high-end, high-rise towers that provide great amenities and convenience. The simple square-shape units meet demands of the sites’ high-density urban context, And are highly efficient for open views from the towers, and thus improving livability of all units. Based on this proven success model for the urban mixed-use residential towers, “Trump World Ⅲ” implemented a highly advanced feature, such as panoramic views for all units by introducing bay-windows that generate octagonal living rooms at each corner of the tower. This tower configuration consisting in four unit types culminates at the “Hannam Hyperion”. Front-loaded units are characterized with the ‘Living room at corners’ strategy that has been previously conceived at the Trump World series. Rear units, adopting merits from the conventional rectilinear slab residence buildings, were transformed to layouts exhibiting a sense of openness from the front of the project. This innovation allowed all units in the tower to capitalize on the views toward the Han River. Recognized as a new prototype of high-density, high-rise residential towers, this configuration is commonly found in the later mixed-use residential developments in the nation. The “Cheongju G-Well City” project saw expansion of this strategic mixed-use vision from the building scale to a city scale, acting as catalyst for urban revitalization.

Western precedents of mixed-use residential condo units are normally laid out spaciously as an individual unit. However, when grouped to form a multiple-unit building, many individual units are forced to compromise their livability. HAEAHN has long devoted itself to developing the mixed-use residential typology that best meets the Korean traditional ‘orientation’ driven preference in residences, while commanding an optimal degree of depth and sense of openness in each individual unit. With careful examination of Korean urban lifestyle and requirements in residences, such as drop-off entry hall, concierge to community amenities, compartmentalization of different uses, pedestrian-vehicles separation, and resident-exclusive green space, HAEAHN has not only pioneered in, but also set a high standard for the urban residential-driven mixed-use typology of Korea, that best suits premium lifestyles and values of the central city area.

From the Nation’s First Street-Type Shopping Mall to the World’s Largest Department Store

Retail stores directly respond to a nation’s economic size and market characteristics during that time. In the previous century, simple merchandise-mass type markets such as traditional markets and department stores prevailed. People in the 21st century, who desire various consumer activities and better values, increasingly demand more comprehensive commercial space that presents diverse lifestyle experience and pleasures in pedestrian-friendly settings. Transcending the lessons learned from the leading countries’ retail environment typologies, Haeahn has been constantly introducing unique commercial space models that meet Korea’s dynamic market characters and spatial demands.

“Yongsan Railway Station–I’Park Mall” project, an exemplary Transit-Oriented Development model of the nation, has transformed the railway station building into a successful mixed-use commercial destination. The I’Park Mall features extensive programs in a circuitous configuration leisure/entertainment programs such as a multiplex theater and digital game battle court: large retail programs such as a department store, electronics-category-killer store, and discount grocery superstore: and indoor mall streetscape filled with various retail and restaurant tenants. For this complex to serve as a catalyst of the city’s greater Yongsan Station area redevelopment plan, deliberately incorporated from the urban planning standpoint are various public components, such as spacious urban plaza and grand stairwells, station atria combined with 3-dimensional inner courtyards, and access roads bridging the complex to adjacent communities. This vast urban destination that supports organic growth of the region and the city later won a prestigious ARCASIA award.

“Lafesta” has a central concept in creating the pedestrian-oriented open-air promenade at the heart of CBD area of a newly emerging town, Ilan. Six city blocks are 3-dimensionally connected by pedestrian bridges, and naturally embrace the central pedestrian boulevard that features dynamic retailers and amenities specialized per zone. This concept has been introduced to “Western Dom”, at the physical culmination-point of the central pedestrian boulevard, and later, replicated by others for the overall urban fabric of Ilsan new town. The tensile membrane roof structure covering the project, not only assures open air, all-weather protection pedestrian promenades, but also seamlessly merges commercial program into the urban streetscape. Developing a series of innovative urban retail complex models by ardently researching how people’s lifestyle interact with carefully designed urban environments, HAEAHN’s strategic commercial planning and environmental design team has grown enormously over the years.

“Centum City Shinsegae” is an UEC (Urban Entertainment Center) built around a department store. Unlike typical western shopping mall developments, the complex was designed to accommodate both present demands and future changes of the department store and the extended mall retailers. While it was deliberately master-planned to embrace Phase 2 and Phase 3 expansions in the future, the current department store complex holds the Guinness Record for the world’s biggest department store. Completed with a variety of programs such as large-scale contemporary Korean spas, fitness, ice link, multiplex theater, and specialty stores in dynamic architectural forms, this complex reflects the energetic character of the Busan metropolitan area. By crafting organic pedestrian flow from underground plazas to waterside parks, and to deep inside the Centum City complex, Haeahn successfully married the typically interior-oriented retail spaces with urban-standpoint environments.

Retail spaces are deeply integrated with urban life experiences. With the goals to offer true public space within commercial driven settings: to integrate interior/exterior space with urban vitality: and to seamlessly coordinate both commercial success and sustainable growth of urban communities, HAEAHN will continue providing for optimum models of Korean retail space.

New Realms of Design through Combining Architecture
with Urban Planning and Landscape Design

Modern built environments in the city require not only architectural expertise, but also a coordinated and integrated effort among diverse design disciplines. HAEAHN has a proven track record of leading successful interdisciplinary synergy, which, without careful execution, would be difficult to attain among the increasingly specialized parties.

At the start of the 21st century HAEAHN participated in the “Yongsan Station Area Master Plan” in tandem with “Yongsan Rapid Train Railway Station Development” project. Proposed was a multi-faceted city concept that transforms the former, largescale train depot site, to a new urban sub-center of Seoul. The plan renders that upper decks atop the existing railway tracks become parks, making connections to the existing Hangang-ro street network. A new central park emerges along the greenbelt extending from the station-neighborhoods to the Han River, arraying international business districts at its perimeter. This attempts to depart from the traditional ‘high-rise-buildings-driven’ paradigm in the urban development of the previous century, and advances toward a sustainable urban space with green space at its center. “Daedeok Techno Valley”, a new multi-faceted city that caused changes to the existing industrial district models, aimed to achieve that residential communities and leisure industries could grow incrementally together. “Incheon Sorae Hanhwa EcoMetro” is a master plan to convert a large-scale former factory site to a composite city including residential/commercial use and green space. By offering parks that represent the regional character of Sorae and its adjacent coastal area, and organically incorporating variable housing types into the setting, it has set a new milestone for future urban development projects. A series of projects such as “Hallyu-wood”, “Universal Studio Korea”, and the “Songdo Tourism Complex” fused mere tourist facilities with variable opportunities to create a new town, a new resort destination, and a newly revitalized urban town center, confirming HAEAHN’s commitment for architectural planning integrated into urban environments. In 2007, by winning the international master planning competition for the Sejong public administration town, HAEAHN shifted gear in its ‘architecture – urban planning – landscape design – integrated’ design practice. The master planning vision of “Flat city, Link city, Zero city” is an epitome of knowledge and expertise of these professional disciplines accumulated over the past few centuries, and a comprehensively novel 21st century synthesis model of the cross-disciplinary design practice. Far from the conventional mega-structure architecture, HAEAHN presented a completely unprecedented vision of merging government buildings with three-dimensional parks. This pursuit of integration was again demonstrated with the winning scheme at the international “Daejeon Station Area Renaissance Ideas” competition. HAEAHN’s idea submitted for the “Gangbuk Grand Park” design competition proved that the urban and building design combined solution, could be successfully adapted to the redevelopment of a traditional park. This effort was later recognized internationally by winning an AIA NY Design Award. Recently, HAEAHN’s enthusiasm for the interdisciplinary and integrated space have enabled the firm to award the “Dapuck International New Town Master Plan” of Danang, Philippines, and demonstrated the ability of HAEAHN Architecture and Korean architects in the global design community.

No longer a narrow discipline, architecture is now considered a widely open field fusing all environment-building expertise such as urban planning, landscape design, and industrial design, and state-of-the-art contemporary fields, such as environmental engineering and information technologies. Staying ahead in this modern trend, HAEAHN Architecture is constantly challenging itself to blur the boundaries among the disciplines and interface them to create a type of built environment the new generation demands.

Enhancing Professional Capacity through Accumulative Experiences in the Specialty Planning and Design

The age of size-driven development and standardized construction advances to a new century of sustainable developments and conscientious changes. Accordingly, our society’s and industries’ demands for professional skills in specialty areas significantly increase, and people's pursuit for quality healthcare and holistic lifestyles diversely expands. Having been commissioned for varied state-of-the-art R&D facilities and special-use building types, HAEAHN Architecture has proactively equipped itself to exceed the critical requirements of these particular purpose complexes of our times.

The “Osong Bio-Health Technopolis National Research Institute” project, which will house four major relocated national research institutions, e.g. Disease Control Headquarters, not only functionally embraces research units such as BSL3 Special Labs, but also organically blends programs and uses to promote social exchanges in eco-friendly environments. HAEAHN's R & D specialty planning team also undertook the “Next Generation Fusion Technology Institute” in Gwangkyo new town, and the “Microwave Photon Beam Special Research Complex” in the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology.

Commissioned to design "Seoul Research Institute of Public Health and Environment", HAEAHN further showcases its expertise with medical-purpose facilities. “Seoul Memorial Park” is a crematorium that voluntarily employed the premium level of pollutant emission standards. By combining green technologies and components with the ingenuity of architectural features of the facility, HAEAHN has again demonstrated its firmly growing design capacity in the highly specialized building types of complex programs.

Toward a New Horizon of Architecture:
Architecture of Authentic Contemporary Aesthetics
& Architecture of Symbiosis with Nature

A new era’s values and ideals are manifested through architecture. By inventing and incorporating design virtues that enrich people’s lives, HAEAHN Architecture has been a national leader of contemporary architectural culture, and a deliverer of numerous noteworthy projects of the nation and beyond. We carry out our artistic aspiration to create iconic works in the new century, and seek to construct sustainable structures to the fullest extent, both in form and essence. We stay on a mission to achieve architectural aesthetics of Korean values and of world-class excellence.

In the “2010 Shanghai Expo Korea Business Pavilion”, we showcased a luminous spiral form that bespeaks dynamics and progress of contemporary Korea. The “Floating Island” at the Han River, composed of three man-constructed islands, have a storyline of a flower bud’s blooming process with reference to the ‘Han River Renaissance’, a master plan vision of the city government.

Opening to the public in phases in 2011, this sculptural structure immediately emerges as the city’s cultural landmark that interacts with citizens and visitors.

HAEAHN’s design approach for the seamless ‘architecture – urban planning – landscape design – integration’ combined with deter mination to fulfill genuine sustainable architecture was clearly demonstrated at the “Ansan Sangrok District Government Complex”. This complex, characterized by the gently sloped green space and the inner courtyard penetrating the complex, serves as an exuberant, 3-dimensional open space for the district community. The WAN-Award-winning “KEPCO Headquarters” design submission was recognized as a brilliant proposal that used the ‘Passive Design’ environmental technologies as a device to ‘carve’ the building mass of the complex, giving rise to a distinctive architectural sculpture. Although this project will not get built, this proposal attested to HAEAHN’s fundamental ambition and in-depth knowledge to achieve quintessentially sustainable architecture.

Preceding this remarkable innovation are the prominent series of government complexes which are now taking on a physical form in Sejong. HAEAHN’s master plan vision for the city is being fulfilled with the distinguished integration of low-rise government buildings and continuous public parks. The “2012 Yeosu Expo International Pavilion” design, inspired by the archipelago of Yeosu’s coastal line, is cited as a monumental example of architecture that exhibits both Korean values and regional character and is perfected by modern taste and smart green technologies. When this Pavilion hosts the World Expo in 2012, the unique structure depicting the concept of ‘Third Nature’ will draw international acclaim.

“Seoul Memorial Park”, a crematorium to be completed in 2012, and is configured as if it is burrowing into the ground in response to the program requirements of the facility. But it opens up to memorial spaces that surround meditative inner courtyards and water features and symbolize the concept of return to an eternal realm. The overall ground and landscape were sculpted to convey the impression of an offered flower. Projects selected and described above represent HAEAHN’s persistent quest of architecture in conjunction with artistic expressions, sustainable environments, and contemporary vernacularism. Seeking to create enduring values with architecture, HAEAHN continuously learns from traditional wisdom, and relentlessly adopts the most cutting-edge knowledge.

Starting from the understanding of how Korean architecture relates to nature, aiming at reaching the ultimate architectural aesthetics and tectonics that reflect Asian values and rewrite the international standards, HAEAHN Architecture steadily makes strides as a pioneer toward a new era.

As a Pioneering Architectural Design Firm which makes New Standards in the Globe

HAEAHN Architecture is extending its overseas businesses to Asia, Middle East, America and Europe beyond Korea. And we are attempting new approaches including design-build and etc. in the international markets, based on the various know-how acquired in domestic and international areas.

CUSTOMIZED TEAM SYSTEM: To perform architectural design service in the international environment, strategies to respond to various situations in various countries and uniqueness of overseas business are necessary and also time constraints and limits of project cost have to be overcome. The overseas division, which has specialties in overseas business, takes a central role and each design division is in charge of design reflected cultural value and specialization of each project. At the same time HAEAHN Architecture organizes strategic TFT where overseas project division and relevant divisions jointly review systems and standards for localization and have consultations together. ‘Tashkent, Uzbekistan Masterplan Project’ holds a valid meaning in resolving a shortage of city infra and residence problems for city residents as well as proposing a standard model of city development for developing countries as a place for international finance business that revitalizes their cultural historicity. HAEAHN Architecture rearranged the existing old living environment with the goal of ’Re-birth of City, Reform of City and Evolution of City’ and proposed a city model that can create a complex city organically connected by overlapping spaces for giving a boost to it.

DESIGN-BUILD: HAEAHN Architecture provided satisfactory results to the project owner through Design-Build approach for ‘Daphuoc International New Town Masterplan’ based on knowhow acquired from various city development projects and also successfully realized a new architectural model in international architectural market. Based on affluent cultural resources of Danang city in Vietnam, this project is, as a reclamation project of 236ha to create a new international business city connecting to its old city, minimized confusion and errors that can be occurred in the process of progress by unifying design and construction.

This approach to projects is made by lots of know-how acquired so far and is extending to special areas of architecture. The representative instance is 'Philippine Arena Project’ This project is receiving a favorable evaluation in keeping a leading design for the biggest complex dome typed performance hall in the world and at the same time successfully performing a technical proposal with Design-Build to secure project cost and period.

CONTINUOUS INNOVATION: HAEAHN Architecture is proving once again its abilities through ‘Bismayah New City Project, Iraq’ which is a new city development project for 600,000 populations that combines its creative design abilities and technical skills. HAEAHN Architecture keeps challenging focusing on its overall capabilities that encompass architecture, urban, landscape and engineering from verification of production method through thorough analysis to make ‘modern Islamic city’ to the process to create a space that can maximize the city residents’ satisfaction.

To create cities and architectures that correspond to changing international and local environments, HAEAHN Architecture continues to challenge and makes new values through various sights and approaches. HAEAHN Architecture is leading the international architectural area with these devoted know-hows, attitudes focused on basic values and continuous efforts for innovation.