Another view of Sustainable Design

In fact, the concept of Sustainable Design is not just about environmental friendliness, we must also look forward to design for the surrounding contexts such as society, people and the environment. The examples of key issues under this concept are known as Reuse and Recycle.

It was a good opportunity for Nippon Paint to speak with Khun Bew-Manatspong Sanguanwuthirojana, Architect & Design Director from Hypothesis Sustainable, who involved in the renovation of many old buildings or sites to become valuable places, not just a green space.

Khun Bew: What Hypothesis was interested in for a while was renovating old or abandoned buildings. We have had the opportunity to do it with many places, for example Vivarium where we have warehouses of old tractors to be renovated into a restaurant and wedding venue. It was to recycle to bring back some value. The work has won world-class awards making our team interested in recycle space again.

Another project that we have had the opportunity to do is Lhong 1919 from Khun Pia – Rujiraporn Wanglee, owner of PIA Interior, who gave our team the opportunity to do the research on her own area to see how the area should be improved and what the guidelines and plans for improvement were. Eventually, the Wanglee family chose to become a Cultural Community. We worked together with many teams. From the former ruins with a rotten wooden staircase that was easily broken and the very rotten bricks, we repaired this area completely within 9 months. Being considered a success, Lhong 1919 is like a diamond that has been cut but buried in the ground.

From an old warehouse to a Factoria, Khun Bew: From all of the above, we started to make our own project. We searched for warehouses all over Bangkok with all potential and finally found Warehouse 26 that was about to be rented. We wrote a plan to propose to the owner that if Hypothesis was a tenant, we would turn this neighborhood into a designer community and then we would act as a hub and restaurant. The area for organizing various events would be a community that benefits all the people around here. As the owner saw our intention, Hypothesis was given the opportunity to rent this warehouse to create the Factoria. We recycled and used design to drive. This makes the warehouse a flexible space, a restaurant, a cafe, and can be adapted to host an event. Our office is in a hidden area. We deliberately designed an entrance that no one knows. We make the reverse assumption whether it is necessary or not that design office has to be seen. We do not care if office design has to be beautiful. We feel that those things are fundamental things that every office tries to do. It will it be beneficial if office think of the opposite as contradictory. We think that if everyone walks forward, everyone was trying to compete. We do not want to compete with others. If we walk backwards and look behind, we might see it from another view without having to compete with anyone. That is the viewpoint of Hypothesis. Part of Factoria’s sustainability is that we do not want to dismantle the entire warehouse, replace it or add steel. We add it respectfully. We can use the existing stuffs and see the potential to design to be as original as possible. This is another way of sustainability.

Sustainable that answers Khun Bew’s hypothesis: I feel that style is a matter of answering the needs of the owner. It is up to the question of how the customer wants us to answer that hypothesis. It is all an experiment. If not, we will challenge ourselves as well. We do not stick to whether we have to do modern only or minimal only. We want to try everything and see if our potential or questioning really meets that requirement. The important thing is to answer the question and meet the satisfaction of the users. That means the hypothesis has been answered. It is us who make it sustain. For some things have already been made but do not meet the customer’s needs, you can demolish it and build a new one. It just does not make sense. Sustainability can be made in various forms, not just green spaces.

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