YEOSU PAVILION

A life-giving resource that inhales and exhales with the cycle of the day and seasons — From a distance the pavilion appears as an iconic image suggestive of water, waves, liquid transparency. As the visitor approaches along the breakwater, the image resolves into an undulating metal canopy, bathing visitors in an ebb and flow of shadows, floating above an immense, open horizontal wood platform. Under the shade of the canopy, a glass pavilion covers the extensive exhibition spaces emergent from beneath the platform. The pavilion’s public platform is parallel to the breakwater, while the glass pavilion and the tectonic orientation of the canopy above are shifted 13 degrees to align to the larger celestial order, true north/south. The steel canopy, born of experiments with slit rubber and paper is designed to occlude high overhead sunlight, allowing more light during the winter and morning and evening hours. Each day at solar noon the canopy momentarily eclipses all direct sunlight, eventfully marking the time of day. The lower pavilion is a double walled thermos that holds a reservoir of cooling water, replenished by tidal action twice daily.