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How a high-modernism project in High-

modernism
South Korea failed: Sewoon Sangga project in
South Korea
(1966–1972), the first
experimental modern planning
Ho Soon Choi Received 30 July 2023
Revised 30 September 2023
Department of Architecture, Gachon University, Seongnam, Republic of Korea 18 October 2023
Accepted 22 October 2023

Abstract
Purpose – This study defines and critically analyzes Korean high modernism using the Sewoon Sangga
project as a case study, as it has significant value in Korea’s urban and architectural history.
Design/methodology/approach – The methodology applied for this study was a theory-interpretive
analysis. This study examines the modernization process of Seoul based on the concept of “high modernism,” in
that the theory-interpretive analysis method analyzes historical phenomena centered on a specific concept.
Findings – As a form of national belief, the various ideas that give birth to modern cities are defined as “high
modernism.” As a Korean megastructure, the Sewoon Sangga project is significant in the history of Korean
urbanism and architecture because it is the archetype of Korean high modernism and is representative of South
Korea’s compressed economic growth. However, soon-to-be-demolished Sewoon Sangga signifies the failure of
Korean high modernism. This study identified the critical characteristics of Korean high modernism through
the Sewoon Sangga project.
Originality/value – This study analyzed a representative Asian city through the specific concept of high
modernism. It transpired that high modernism, which played an important role in the birth and development of
modern cities, should be transformed for future cities and architectural development. This study has
significance in that it expands the study of the history of urbanism and architecture centered on the West to the
same in Asia.
Keywords Sewoon Sangga project, Korean high modernism, Megastructure, Seoul’s modernization
Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction
Increasing literacy and lexical similarity, and focusing on nature and land, expedited many
modern states’ development. Science and technology and the eighteenth-century’s
enlightenment resulted in spatial land planning that facilitated the rapid development of
cities. The eighteenth-century Industrial Revolution was instrumental in the emergence of
major modern cities in Western Europe in the mid-nineteenth century (Picon, 2002). Urban
planning was one of the most important tasks of the state, in terms of reorganizing urban
space and cultivating the consciousness of civil society (Jun, 2007). The state mobilized
authoritarian state power to modernize the urban space. Modern urban planning, which was
executed with zeal by the state, was a type of belief and ideology known as “high modernism,”
which influenced modern urban planning and nineteenth-century society in general.
Administrative bureaucrats, city planners and architects in the field of modern urban
planning have discovered their utopia in real space via high modernism (Scott, 2010).
Urban modernization has always been premised on the “space revolution” (Jun, 2019),
which facilitated the birth of modern cities. The origin of modern cities can be traced back to
France’s capital, Paris, which underwent urban modernization in the mid-nineteenth century
(Benevolo, 1967; Gaillard, 1997). The urban modernization of Paris during 1853–1870 was a
Archnet-IJAR: International
Journal of Architectural Research
This work was supported by a National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant, funded by the © Emerald Publishing Limited
2631-6862
Korean government, Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT) under Grant No. 2022R1F1A1065442. DOI 10.1108/ARCH-07-2023-0188
ARCH process of space simplification, centralization, straightening and readability carried out by a
powerful state. In the mid-1960s, one century after Paris’ transformation, South Korea’s
capital, Seoul, underwent urban modernization – a spatial revolution. As Paris represented
enlightenment ideology in the modernization of Western cities, South Korea developed a
Korean-style enlightenment ideology for the modernization of urban spaces. The state
developed the “Saemaul Undong” (New Village Movement) in the mid-twentieth century for
the enlightenment of rural areas in South Korea, emphasizing the three spirits of self-help,
self-reliance and cooperation among citizens (Office of the President, 1971). The Saemaul
Undong was a Korean-style enlightenment movement that not only modernized Korea’s
urban space but also sought to improve citizens’ spiritual well-being.
Korea was in ruins in the mid-twentieth century as a result of the Korean War (1950–1953)
and was one of the poorest countries at the time. Under the Chunghee Park [1] regime, the
country began transitioning into a modernized nation in 1961, increasing in power. The Park
regime promoted a modern state aimed at developing the national economy as quickly as
possible.
The Park regime’s national land modernization identified key industries whose
competitiveness could be increased, and established industrial hub cities to develop the
selected industries. The Park regime’s goal for urban modernization was to achieve
“unbalanced growth and linkage effects,” in which profits were transferred to the
substructure despite the fact that the country’s unbalanced development was executed in
several selected industrial-based cities (Cha, 2017). It aimed to become a “compressed growth-
oriented” developing country, with rapid economic growth centered on specific major
industrial cities (Jung, 2017; Kim, 2011; Park, 2004). Seoul’s urban modernization is
distinguished by a focus on speed, with the mobilization of the entire nation serving as the
key to establishing a state-led economic production base (Han, 2010).
The Sewoon Sangga project (hereinafter, “the Project”) was the initial realization of the
Park regime’s Seoul modernization. The project, which was constructed between 1966 and
1972, was a mega-structured urban plan comprising four large buildings that spanned 50 m
in width and 1 km in length. These megastructure project still is still significant in Korea’s
urban and architectural history as a model of modern experimental planning. The Project
exemplified Korea’s high modernism via the state-led “space revolution.”
In April 2022, the Seoul Metropolitan Government decided to demolish Sewoon Sangga,
the first site of Korean-style high modernism (Seoul Metropolitan Government, 2022). This
study focuses on the Seoul Metropolitan Government’s decision to demolish Sewoon
Sangga in 2022, despite the project’s urban and architectural values. This study suggests
that the decision to demolish Sewoon Sangga is indicative of the failure of Korean high
modernism. This study defines Korea’s high modernism through this process, from Sewoon
Sangga’s planning to its completion, and identifies the reason for Sewoon Sangga’s failure
as a model of high modernism in South Korea. Understanding the failure of the Project will
help South Korea usher in a new era of urban and architectural culture. As the project is
little known in Western literature, it may serve as a reference for other large-scale urban
projects.

2. Materials and methods

2.1 Methodology
The methodology applied for this study was a theory-interpretive analysis. The theory-
interpretive analysis method, known as a “concept-dependent method of understanding
history,” derives meaningful interpretations of historical patterns (Skocpol, 1984) and focuses
on enhancing the sociological understanding of historical changes by utilizing specific
concepts. This study examined Seoul’s modernization based on the concept of “high
modernism” in that the theory-interpretive analysis method analyzes historical phenomena High-
centered on a specific concept. modernism
project in
2.2 Discourses on high modernism South Korea
A British geographer named David Harvey coined the term “high modernism” in 1989.
Harvey discovered that high modernism peaked in the twentieth century after Second World
War, and his interest was in capitalism and production companies. The belief in “linear
progress, absolute truths, and rational planning of ideal social orders” is strong in the
standardized conditions of knowledge and production in a capitalist society. Consequently,
“positivistic, techno-centric, and rationalistic” high modernism appeared in the works of elite
avant-garde planners, artists, architects, critics and other gatekeepers of high taste. The
“modernization” of European economies accelerated, while the entire thrust of international
politics and trade was justified as bringing a benevolent and progressive “modernization
process” to a backward Third World (Harvey, 1989).
High modernism, which reached its zenith in the twentieth century, began with the
modernization process in the mid-nineteenth century, which focused on major Western
European countries, specifically on reorganizing their urban spaces. A modern city was
created as a result of this reorganization, and the country consequently developed rapidly.
First, countries that developed through urban modernization in the nineteenth century
pursued the administrative order of nature and society. Rational engineering was widely
applied to control disordered nature and human society. This idea was shared by many
people as a kind of belief and political ideology, which had a strong influence on the nation
and the elite. Second, strong state power was mobilized to achieve urban modernization.
When the concept of modernization is founded on enlightenment, it creates a strong national
belief in the utopia of urban modernization that is divorced from the past and which could be
used to enlighten the general public. Third, civil society lacked the ability to oppose state
power. These modern urbanization processes are distinguished by the fact that high
modernism provided a desire as an ideology, the modern state provided a powerful means for
the desire, and an impotent civil society provided a smooth environment for the state to
satisfy its desires.
Paris, the birthplace of modern cities, exhibited modern urban planning characteristics
during its modernization (Choay, 1969; Scott, 2010). Following the February Revolution of 1848,
Paris’ urban planning underwent the process of urban space readability and simplification
through the straight and centralized road system (Bibliotheque nationale de France, 1868)
(Figure 1). The designers created a highly readable financial space by constructing a straight
road system in an ambiguous urban space. This is critical in establishing the administrative
order of nature and society that modernism seeks. A strong urban space reorganization plan – a
crucial element of high modernism – was then implemented.
Emperor Napoleon III (reigning 1852–1870) and the Prefect of the Seine Georges–Eugene
Haussmann (1853–1870) established Paris’ urban modernization between 1853 and 1870
(Frennmark et al., 2021). Urban modernization was perceived by state powers as a higher-
level enlightenment movement that promoted civil society’s consciousness beyond the simple
reconstruction of physical urban spaces (Fishman, 1982). Modern urban planning was
implemented to illuminate these urban spaces, and modern urban planning was made
possible by unchecked authoritarian state power and the presence of a weak civil society
environment incapable of offering resistance.
The great civic movement of the Paris Commune in 1871 controlled Paris’ modernization
through high modernism, which had been ongoing for 17 years. Even in the twenty-first
century, Paris’ modernization still forms the basis of city planning, and it is significant in the
history of urban planning that it created Paris’ unique urban culture.
ARCH

Figure 1.
Map of Paris in 1868

3. Social context for the rise of high modernism in South Korea

3.1 Development of a political ideology
Following the 1950 Korean War, Korea was divided into North and South, leaving a
devastated country. South Korea began its full-fledged transition to a modern state in 1961,
prior to its democratization era, with the Chunghee Park regime. According to the per capita
GDP reflected in Table 1, Korea was one of the poorest countries in 1960. The Park regime
consequently sought to develop the national economy as quickly as possible through a spatial
revolution. Park’s spatial revolution meant that the state chose a specific industry that could
boost national competitiveness, and planned the industrial base’s urban space for short-term
economic development. The state implemented an economic development strategy based on
“unbalanced growth and linkage effect,” in which profits were transferred to the substructure
via the trickle-down effect, even if unbalanced development continued (Kang, 2007). In 1960,
in line with the government’s slogan of “modernization of the country,” “compressed growth”
was implemented to achieve export-led economic development swiftly during the first,
second and third economic development plans (Lee et al., 2016).

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020

South Korea 79 253 1,174 6,608 12,261 23,083 31,727

Pakistan 83 172 303 372 576 987 1,360
China 90 113 195 318 959 4,550 10,409
Malaysia 235 358 1,775 2,442 4,044 9,041 10,412
Philippines 286 211 778 816 1,073 2,217 3,301
Japan 475 2,056 9,463 25,371 39,169 44,968 39,918
France 1,335 2,857 12,713 21,794 22,420 40,678 39,037
Table 1. United Kingdom 1,398 2,348 10,032 19,095 28,223 39,689 41,098
GDP per capita United States 3,007 5,234 12,575 23,889 36,330 48,651 63,028
indicator Source(s): URL 2, Korean Statistical Information Service (2020)
Since the 1980s, some East Asian countries, such as South Korea, have achieved “compressed High-
development” or faster economic growth than in the past, with a host of concomitant benefits modernism
and problems. The modernization of South Korea, which began in the 1960s and exhibited
typical East Asian compressed development, exerted the strongest influence on Chunghee
project in
Park’s urban ideology (Han, 2016). South Korea
Park first encountered urban planning during the modernization of Manchuria. He lived in
Manchuria’s Manchukuo Military Academy from 1940 to 1945. Large numbers of Koreans
migrated to Manchuria as intentional or arbitrary migration. Intentional migration occurred
because Manchuria was established as an independent state by Japan in March 1932, and
Korea and Manchuria were under Japanese colonial rule at the time. To stabilize Korea’s
colonial rule and address the problem of overpopulation, the Japanese colonial government
relocated a large number of Koreans to Manchuria (Yoo et al., 2007). The arbitrary migration
of Koreans to Manchuria was motivated by Koreans’ perception of Manchuria as a place of
opportunity. Manchuria was promoted as a new market and investment destination for
entrepreneurs, a location for young people to find new opportunities, and a place for farmers
to find new land (Kang and Hyun, 2012).
In 1938, Park, a 21-year-old elementary school teacher, decided to stay in Manchuria to
raise his status and avoid discrimination from the Japanese. He moved to Hsinking,
Manchukuo’s capital, in February 1940, to become a soldier.
Hsinking was undergoing a large-scale urban planning project in Japan at the time.
Starting with the first urban planning in 1932, the city street of Hsinking Metropolitan
Government, the capital of Manchukuo, was born through the fourth urban planning in 1945.
Japan attempted a new state experiment in Manchuria that could not be replicated in Japan.
Manchuria was an experimental site for Japanese architects, allowing them to experiment with
urban planning concepts that could not be done in Japan. Their wages were more than double
than in their home country, enticing many young Japanese architects and construction
engineers to relocate to Manchuria. Manchuria’s urban spaces served as a conduit for young
and ambitious Japanese planners to apply various mainstream urban planning techniques
used in other countries (Akira, 2000). Manchuria’s urban planning was carried out in four
phases from 1932 to 1945, with the focus on Hsinking. Park stayed in Manchuria during the
third period (1938–1942), when the city was the most developed and the economy was thriving,
and he gained a strong impression of Manchuria’s modern land planning and economic
growth. During Park’s absolute state power in the 1960s, the Manchurian development model
was applied to South Korea’s urban space and economic development strategy.

3.2 Emergence of authoritarian planners

Park learned from Manchuria’s modernization that urban space modernization is a
prerequisite for national development. National land modernization was consequently
promoted for export-based compressed economic growth and the political ideology of the
Park regime. Seoul needed urban modernization the most.
Although the first five-year economic development plan (1962–1966) was successfully
promoted, urban problems such as traffic congestion and housing shortages emerged in
Seoul. Seoul’s urban modernization was the most important national project of the Park
regime because it not only solved urban problems but also related directly to economic
development. President Park required a capable mayor to oversee the modernization of
Seoul’s urban space, which proved to be Hyunok Kim (Seoul mayor April 4, 1966–April 15,
1970). Both men had military backgrounds and established a top-down system for Seoul’s
modernization.
The spatial plan of the South Korean national territory represented by Seoul was a
compressed large-space renovation, analogous to compressed economic growth. President
ARCH Park, who had absolute authority in the compressed modernization of land and space,
determined the plan’s direction, and Mayor Kim was responsible for implementing it. The
success of South Korea’s national land modernization can be attributed to President Park’s
clear goal setting and Mayor Kim’s responsible management as the “bulldozer mayor” with a
builder’s image (Kim, 1969).
Before being appointed mayor of Seoul, Hyunok Kim was the mayor of Busan, Korea’s
second-largest port city, from April 1962 to March 1966. During his tenure as mayor of Busan,
Kim successfully completed the urban modernization of that city by introducing a
management mindset that incorporated the unemployed, as well as port maintenance, into the
city administration. Kim, a former military transportation officer, recognized the importance
of infrastructure, which is the heart of urban space modernization, to the point that he placed
the slogan “the City is a Line” at the forefront of the city administration (Seoul Museum of
History, 2016). Kim’s practical experience in urban planning was his greatest asset in
realizing President Park’s goal of modernizing the land. The modernization of Seoul was
thoroughly executed from the perspective of economic production by the powerful state
authority, represented by President Park and Mayor Kim. Amidst Korea’s extreme poverty in
the early 1960s, the success of Seoul’s modernization reflected its clear and strong will to
achieve the political ideology of national revival. Mayor Kim systematized Seoul’s spatial
plan to maximize the nation’s economic output, resulting in the establishment of Korea’s first
urban plan in 1966. Kim, who became mayor of Seoul on April 4, 1966, unveiled the Seoul
Master Plan in May (Park, 1966). The Seoul Master Plan was a long-term comprehensive plan
for a modern city that would accommodate a population of five million by 1985 (Division
Urban Planning, 1966). This Master Plan was the first to systematize Seoul’s urban spatial
structure and played an important role in planning the overall transportation, industry and
residential spaces throughout South Korea.
Upon his inauguration as mayor of Seoul, Kim presented the direction of Seoul’s future
space structure through the Seoul Master Plan, after which the land readjustment project was
implemented to reorganize the city’s urban space. To successfully implement the five-year
economic development plan implemented in the early 1960s, Mayor Kim carried out a large-
scale land readjustment project. The resultant land readjustment project, which was
implemented in the 1960s, was the largest in the history of land readjustment projects
conducted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, covering 58,550,905 m2 in 17 districts in
Seoul (Figure 2, left). The 50,629,545 m2 area of 11 districts, representing 86% of the total size
of this land readjustment project, was renovated in only two years (April 1966–January 1968)
during Mayor Kim’s four-year tenure (Figure 2, right) (Seoul Metropolitan Government, 2017).

Figure 2.
Scale of land
readjustment in Seoul
by year (left), and scale
of land readjustment in
Seoul in the
1960s (right)
It was possible to execute the land readjustment project in Seoul rapidly and on a large scale High-
because it was a pre-modern society in which President Park and Mayor Kim enjoyed modernism
complete authority. The land readjustment project was the expression of the country’s strong
political ideology, which recognized land space as a condition for economic production.
project in
South Korea
3.3 Sewoon Sangga project (1966–1972): realization of the first high-modernism project in
South Korea concept: urban and architectural planning for economic production
Mayor Kim promoted projects that symbolized Seoul’s modernization. His first
modernization project in Seoul was more than just reorganizing the city’s urban space; it
reflected his intention to declare the transition of South Korea into a modern nation. Mayor
Kim therefore promoted the project so that the modernization process of Seoul could be
completed quickly. The first such modernization project was named “Sewoon Sangga,” which
translates to “the energy of the world gather here” (Son, 2003), representing the beginning of
Seoul’s modernization. The project’s target location was a 50 m-wide, 1 km-long urban
planning street in Seoul’s Jongno area (Seoul Museum of History, 2006) (Figure 3). During
Japan’s colonial era in Korea, this site was created as a road and firebreak, and the Seoul
Metropolitan Government owned it for urban planning purposes since Korea’s liberation in
1952. It was the best place to promote large-scale projects because it was an empty, large-scale
urban planning street owned by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, and Mayor Kim could
commence with the project immediately. Mayor Kim could justify demolishing unlicensed
houses that were illegally occupying the urban planning street by citing the time for city

Figure 3.
Map of Jongno area in
1966, which shows the
road of fire breaks
(50 m wide and 1 km
long) in the face of
incendiary bombing
(hatched)
ARCH purification. The large-scale urban planning project was the most effective and powerful way
for Mayor Kim to promote Seoul’s modernization.
The new buildings to be built on narrow and long sites were planned to be vertical, rather
than flat. By increasing the floor area ratio on the limited site, the high-rise buildings were
designed to maximize profitability. Commercial facilities were arranged to be located on the
1st–4th floors of the building, while residential units were to be located on the higher floors.
A pedestrian-only public street was proposed on second-floor level on either side of the
building, and space under the aerial street was planned as a car-only road on first-floor level
(Figure 4). This aerial street concept was consistent with the automobile-centered modern
urban planning that was popular in the early twentieth century (Buchanan, 1963). To avoid
obstructing traffic, pedestrians were relocated to the second-floor aerial street. The Project
was designed so that four large residential and commercial complexes, totaling 1 km in
length, were linked by an aerial street 6.1 m above the ground. The infrastructure was well
designed to ensure smooth traffic flow and straighten the urban space. As a common feature
of modern urban planning, the pursuit of maximizing economic production by straightening
the urban space through infrastructure and smooth logistics flow was applied as an
important planning concept in the Project. Sewoon Sangga is architecturally significant
because it is Korea’s first multi-use residential-commercial complex. The project is also
significant in terms of architectural engineering because it is a structure that combines
modern reinforced concrete building materials with the early development of Korea’s own
construction technology at the time (Rowe et al., 2021).

3.4 Influx of western modernism and architectural design to maximize capital production
The modern architecture movement, which was the mainstream of world architecture at the
time, heavily influenced Sewoon Sangga’s initial design. Mayor Kim established the Korea
Engineering Consultants Corporation (KECC) as a state-run enterprise in 1965 to execute
large-scale national projects. The Project was designed by the KECC.
Swoogeun Kim, an architect and KECC vice-president, was in charge of the Project’s urban
and architectural design. Swoogeun Kim studied architecture in Tokyo during 1951–1960.
During his study abroad, he was heavily influenced by the architectural ideas of Kenzo
Tange, a world-renowned architect (Cho, 2021; Kim, 2006). At that time, the Japanese
architectural community was pushing to re-establish Japanese architecture after the war. The
traditional controversy of Japanese architecture arose amidst the influx of modernism: if the

Figure 4.
Cross-section of
Sewoon Sangga made
in 1966
architecture of the closed traditional Japanese concept were used, the Western architectural High-
community would criticize it because it would appear to recreate the pre-war nationalist modernism
architecture. However, the Japanese architectural world could not accept Western
architectural trends uncritically. Thus, Kenzo Tange contended that Western modernist
project in
architecture already existed in traditional Japanese architecture, and that Japanese South Korea
architecture and Western modernist architecture should be considered jointly. Kenzo
Tange’s goal was to create a new architecture that would extend beyond current modernism,
proclaiming the universalization of thought that transcends locality (Jung, 1996). The
international status of Kenzo Tange’s Japanese architecture stems from Western countries’
lively interest in Japanese architecture in the early twentieth century, and the international
exchange of young Japanese architects.
Kenzo Tange established himself as an international architect by announcing the
Hiroshima City Plan at the invitation of the Conges International d’Architecture Moderne
(CIAM), which was founded by Le Corbusier in 1928 (Lee, 1998). Kenzo Tange pursued the
new postwar architectural trend, but the premise was that it was based on Japanese tradition
and attempted to equal the Japanese tradition to Western modern architectural trends, which
was absolute to Swoogeun Kim, who pursued a new Korean city and architecture after its
liberation from Japanese occupation. Korea’s first-generation modern architect, Swoogeun
Kim, was tremendously influenced by Le Corbusier’s modernist city and architectural design
through Kenzo Tange, as well as his personal academic interest while studying in Japan.
Finally, in 1966, Swoogeun Kim received authorization from Seoul Mayor Hyeonok Kim, and
he began the large-scale project known as Sewoon Sangga.
In 1952, architect Le Corbusier constructed the “Unite d’habitation” residential complex
building in Marseilles, France. Kenzo Tange, a follower of Le Corbusier’s architectural
thoughts, visited the Unite d’habitation in 1951 and praised it, saying, “I’ve never seen such a
moving modern architecture” (Jung, 1996). Naturally, Swoogeun Kim, who was completely
influenced by Kenzo Tange, desired to realize Le Corbusier’s Unite d’habitation in Seoul.
Sewoon Sangga, which was inspired by Unite d’habitation, was thus constructed. The length
of the Unite d’habitation project completed in 1952 was 165 m, while the total length of the
Project was 1 km (Figure 5) (Le Corbusier, 1995). This is a typical Korean high-modern city
plan in which a mega-structure, rather than a simple building, is built into a site 50 m wide
and 1 km long. It demonstrates the future direction of modernization in Seoul. The Project
faithfully adhered to the idea of removing the shade of the existing city and establishing a
new urban culture, the pursuit of clarity in urban space, and a high-modernist plan that
recognizes urban and architectural planning as economic production. The reinforced concrete
construction method, a symbol of modernization in architecture, was used to build the Project.
The panoramic view of the Project, which was 1 km long from the center of Seoul in a north-
south direction and consisted of concrete buildings, some of which resembled ships,
overwhelmed the existing low urban landscape and expressed the Korean high-modernism
plan as a landscape (Urban Design Institute of Korea, 2012) (Figure 6, left). The urban
planning of the Project was a recreation of the “Plan Voisin,” a Paris city plan proposed by Le

Figure 5.
Unite d’habitation,
with a length of 165 m,
was completed in 1952
in Marseilles, France
(top). Sewoon Sangga
project, with a length of
1 km, was completed in
1972 in Seoul, Korea
(bottom)
ARCH Corbusier in 1925 (Tzonis, 2001) (Figure 6, right). The purpose of Plan Voisin was to
reimagine the eternal center of Paris, targeting the dirtiest and most congested streets in the
city’s center. A vertical city was to be created by erecting high-rise buildings on a grid-like
checkerboard site with extensive arterial roads (Le Corbusier, 1994).

3.5 Design of the Sewoon Sangga project

The Project emphasized Seoul’s symbolism by renovating an underdeveloped space in the
city’s center. It was intended as a vertical city in the style of Le Corbusier’s Plan Voisin, and as
a massive horizontal city stretching along 1 km. It was an expanded version of Le Corbusier’s
Plan Voisin and a local experimental urban and architectural project.
The Project, which consisted of large groups of buildings spanning 1 km, was a model of
exhibition administration that symbolized Seoul’s modernization (Urban Management
Department, 1975); thus, it had to be completed quickly. Owing to the short construction
period, numerous modifications were made to the initial design.
First, the aerial street on the third floor, which was elevated 6.1 m high above ground level,
was completed differently from the original plan. As the height of the ground-level storage
space increased, the originally planned height of the aerial street was increased from 6.1 to
7.2 m, which was more than 1 m higher than the original height (Figure 7, A). Consequently,
there was no reason for pedestrians to walk on the two-story-high concrete floor, and
attractive shops could not be built on the aerial street because there were no people. The aerial
street was built to establish Sewoon Sangga’s core principle of being a pedestrian-only
shopping mall, designed with artificial road pavements and landscaping for pedestrian
convenience. However, such investments to strengthen the public nature were not made for
reasons of economic feasibility. Second, the planned facility space (pipe duct) for the lower
part of the fifth-floor level was scrapped (Figure 7, B). The facility space was designed to
reclaim various living spaces and to create artificial land for residents. The concept of
artificial land was borrowed from Unite d’habitation and public and commercial facilities for
residents were intended to be located within the artificial land. However, the facility space
was abandoned in favor of increasing the height of the commercial space on the fourth floor.
Third, the building’s important design concept was altered. A courtyard was planned for the
center of the building to provide lighting and ventilation, but it was never constructed. To
reduce the perception of Sewoon Sangga as a massive structure, the initial design called for
the volume to recede as one ascended to the upper floors of the building. Finally, the width of
the balconies was increased to maximize balcony space in the building’s residential upper
floors. Consequently, the building was finished with the appearance of a rigid structure
(Figure 7, C). Fourth, a long-span Y-shaped structure was planned for the parking space on

Figure 6.
The Sewoon Sangga
project with a total
length of 1 km
completed in 1972 (left).
Le Corbusier’s plan in
1925 for the city of
Paris (Plan
Voisin) (right)
 High-
modernism
project in
South Korea

Figure 7.
Drawings from before
and after the
construction of the
Sewoon Sangga project
in 1966 (left) and 1975
(right), respectively

ground level to facilitate a smooth flow of cars and design the elevation of the building, but a
plain column structure was eventually built in the interests of cost savings and construction
convenience (Figure 7, D).
The initial design of the Project was altered during the construction process due to the
Seoul Metropolitan Government’s poor execution of the construction and inadequate
supervision. The city of Seoul gave the mayor of the district and public officials under the
Seoul Metropolitan Government an absolute construction order to complete the Project as
soon as possible. The construction cost was reduced prior to construction, the design was
changed due to unexpected circumstances during the construction process and the number of
floors of the building was changed. Before construction, an official document prepared by the
Seoul Metropolitan Government stated that the design could be changed to reduce
construction costs and to account for unexpected situations during the construction process,
and even the number of floors in the building could be changed (Division Housing, 1966). As a
result of the aforementioned changes to the original plan, negligent management and poor
supervision by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, and the goal of maximizing the profits of
the private construction companies, the completed Sewoon Sangga was entirely different
from the initial plan. The exterior of Korean apartments is typically shaped like a matchbox;
ARCH therefore, it is difficult for the exterior to escape criticism, because securing the maximum
floor area ratio is directly related to corporate profits.
The first Korean-style modern architectural plans proposed for Sewoon Sangga were as
follows: First, an aerial street with green vegetation and various amenities were proposed.
Second, despite a slightly reduced floor-area ratio, lighting and ventilation were to be
provided via a building with varying volumes and an empty atrium space in the center. Third,
planners proposed an architectural structure that added design to the existing massive
architectural structure at the expense of architectural research. Fourth, in preparation for the
future automobile era, planners proposed a vehicle parking space on the ground floor without
commercial facilities. Companies seeking to maximize profits through architectural space
consequently rejected these architectural plans.
Besides companies pursuing profits in the Project, the main reason for the project’s failure
to adopt Korean-style modernism was that the government aided the companies’ illegal
activities at the time, and pushed for large projects in a short period for Mayor Kim’s window
dressing. Even if it could not stand up to the logic of capitalist conglomerates, Sewoon Sangga
could be established as a prototype of Korea’s first modern urban landscape and architecture
project as a single 1-km project. However, the revised Sewoon Sangga plan remains a big
mistake in that it failed to establish Korea’s urban and architectural modernization, in
addition to the problem of design changes during the construction phase of the Project
(Plate 1).

4. Discussions and conclusion

Modern cities were crucial to South Korea’s national development. The country arose as a
developed country as a result of its urban modernization process, which commenced in the
mid-twentieth century. Its urban modernization began with the reorganization of the Seoul
metropolitan area, and the Project was the first to modernize the city. From the perspective of
urban modernity, the Project symbolized a break from the legacy of 35 years of Japanese
imperialism and the poverty caused by the country’s ruins after the Korean War, and also the
transition to a modern city.
The Project was undertaken on a large scale to depict South Korea’s modernity. The
Project, which consisted of several buildings 50 m wide and 1 km long, was designed to
resemble multiple ships sailing from the Seoul of the past to the Seoul of the future.
Construction was completed in a short period (1966–1972). The Project was the tangible
manifestation of a political ideology to achieve national development through urban spatial
revolution. Strong state power in the persons of President Chunghee Park and Seoul Mayor

Plate 1.
The city of Seoul
decided to demolish
Sewoon Sangga
Hyeonok Kim was the central component of the Project, which reflected the political ideology High-
for national revival. A comprehensive technocratic bureaucracy was established to modernism
effectively transmit upper-level decisions to the lower levels. Thus, the Project was a
planning concept based on the political ideology of national revival dictated by state power,
project in
and it was the result of a well-organized bureaucracy putting this concept into action. The fact South Korea
that the Project was carried out as a state-run project with strong authority to embody the
political ideology that was focused on South Korea’s industrialization, economy and
technology, is a typical feature of the nineteenth-century’s high modernism that laid the
foundation of the modern city. The Project’s high modernism influenced Korean society by
serving as a political ideology; a small group of planners who wanted to establish capitalism
and production organizations in Seoul’s urban space.
The Project is significant in the history of Korean urbanism and architecture because it is
the archetype of Korean high modernism and is representative of South Korea’s compressed
economic growth. Beginning with the Project, high modernism played an important role in
the country’s development. However, the critical characteristics of high modernism were
present during the project. First, it implemented a plan that affected all city residents, yet
overlooked the city’s public nature, which is the most important aspect of urban planning.
The Project was led by a state that recognized the importance of spatial planning in economic
production and maximizing profits for large corporations. As a result, Sewoon Sangga was
constructed in the form of a residential and commercial complex filled with commercial
facilities, resulting in the privatization of public urban spaces. Second, in urban
policymaking, state and minority planners abused their authority. Korea, one of the
poorest countries in the 1960s, lacked even the concept of civil society to check the power of
the state. In this social reality, the state promoted window dressing to enlighten citizens, and
as an experiment for planners to realize their design ideals. The Project, Korea’s first
modernization project, resulted from the state and large private companies’ non-critical
acceptance of the West’s modernism. However, it is positive that in the Project’s existence of
over 50 years, various entities centered around Sewoon Sangga have created community
models such as residents’ councils and cooperatives. These social community organizations
are actively involved in the urban regeneration project of the old city center and are playing a
role in ameliorating the problems of Seoul’s high modernism.
By investigating the Project, which was very important for South Korea’s urban
modernization, this study defined and critically examined Korean high modernism. Urban
development is still necessary for national development, always accompanied by spatial
planning, which is important because it realizes public planning that affects all residents. The
role of the planners is vital. Finally, Korean high modernism, which emerged in the mid-
twentieth century, will have ramifications for role players in future Korean urban planning,
the realization of publicity in urban planning, and the role of civil society.
The soon-to-be-demolished Sewoon Sangga marks the end of high modernism, which
facilitated South Korea’s development in the mid-twentieth century. The Project will
serve as an excellent basis for a new vision of urban planning after its demolition. Follow-
up research will study how South Korea’s high modernism evolved, targeting the new
urban project that will replace Sewoon Sangga. South Korea is an advanced country in
the ICT field, and smart cities integrated with ICT are currently being actively
developed. Smart cities, which are executed out through the national land policy, tend to
be state-led urban planning, which has a strong tendency toward new South Korean high
modernism. Future research is planned to study the evolved high modernism regarding
the roles of the state, various experts and civil societies in Korea’s ongoing smart city
planning.
ARCH Notes
1. Chunghee Park served as the 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th President of the Republic of Korea from 1963
to 1979.

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About the author

Ho Soon Choi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Architecture, Gachon University, South
Korea. He obtained his Ph.D. in City Planning from the Graduate School of Environmental Studies, Seoul
National University. His research focus has been on urban theory and architectural modernism. Ho Soon
Choi can be contacted at: hosoon@gachon.ac.kr

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