Urban Context of Church Architecture & Spatial Reconfiguration Aimed for Improving Utility in Using Architectural Space
Park Seungbae, Oh Sangjoon*, Yeo Jangkwon, Kim Hongkyu
- Department of Urban Planning & Engineering, The Graduate School, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea
Published in The First NZAAR International Event Series on Natural and Built Environment, Cities, Sustainability and Advanced Engineering, Putrajaya, Malaysia, 26 June 2016, pages 154 to 155. New Zealand Academy of Applied Research. ISSN 2463-5979 (online), 2463-5960 (print).
Abstract
The goal of the present study is to analyze the spatial utility of Korean church buildings, as well as cost efficiency in their construction, while interpreting the urban context they are associated with, by exploring the spatial placement within buildings and their use rate and calculating construction cost by section. A key finding of this study is that there has been a significant deviation from the ministry of Christianity in the architectural spatial layout of church buildings. Architectural space of church must be recomposed so as to meet the nature of ministry of gospel, of which direction is that the space of church buildings must be allocated in a balanced manner according to the purpose and weight of church missions such as worship, regional society, education. Setting aside the current design tendency that is excessively focused on having a worship-oriented space around a main chapel, architectural spaces must be redesigned to allow for ministry-oriented spaces inclusive of interactions with the community, education, culture and human intercourse, which highlights the need to reduce worship space while enlarging the spatial ratio toward intercommunicative, cultural and fellowship interactions with the community. Considering that small groupings for church activity are expected to be a dynamic force in the future, the physical space of churches must be sectioned into smaller ones so that a variety of demands within a church can be absorbed, and this flexible spatial configuration can accommodate gatherings by small groups. Protestant churches in Korea must significantly reduce their gross areas. Protestant churches was analyzed determined as 3.8~5.4 ້, which is two times higher than that of Catholic churches, 1.0~2.6 ້. This means that protestant churches use excessive space compared to catholic churches, and the gross area of present protestant churches can be reduced to half. The core of this indicates the change in the conventional concept about church architecture as well as spatial reconfiguration and multi-functionalization of church architecture, which is the essence and key implication of this study.
Keywords: Church; Urban Context; Reconfiguration of Architectural Space; Utility; Multi-functionalization
Rights
Copyright © New Zealand Academy of Applied Research Ltd 2016. All rights reserved. Reproduced in the GDI Academy archive from the original proceedings without change to the authors’ text.