timmyyoonterm1 by 20142015timmyyoon

The London Suburb that is home to more North Korean defectors than anywhere in Europe

NEW MALDEN

GREATER LONDON New Malden’s most notable feature is its 8000-strong Korean population, with North Korean defectors making up over 600 of that number. This makes New Malden the most popular location in Europe for the North Korean diaspora, and one of the world’s largest communities of North Koreans outside of the DPRK itself.

NORTH KOREAN REFUGEE IN EUROPE STATISTICS

KINGSTON UPON THAMES

New Malden Immigration Statistics

New Malden Benefits & Unemployment Statistics

These figures for Country of Birth for the residents of New Malden are from the UK Census of 2011. Since New Malden has a lower level of residents born in the UK than the national average and a higher rate of residents either born in other EU countries or outside the EU, it does have a significant immigrant population.

These figures on the claiming of benefits in New Malden come from the Department for Work & Pensions and are dated . They can often be a good indicator of the prosperity of the town and possible indicator of how hard it would be to get employment in the area. The rate of claiming any benefit (which includes in work benefits) is more than 10% lower in New Malden than the national average, suggesting higher salaries than the average in the area.

45%

800

The UK allowed refuge to almost all North Korean defectors in Europe

United Kingdom 71.7% 86.2% Rebublic of Ireland

1.2%

0.7%

Other EU 6.9% 3.7% Outside the EU

20.1%

9.4%

BENEFIT

KINGSTON UPON THAMES

ENGLAND

Jobseekers 1.5% 3.3% Allowance (only)

atio

ENGLAND

opul

appox.

600

KINGSTON UPON THAMES

nt P

appox.

COUNTRY

igra

REST OF EUROPE

Imm

UNITED KINGDOM

Incapacity Benefits 1.5% 2.4% (IB or ESA)

Nat

ive

38%

New Malden Population Chart

7% 12%

Any Benefit 7.4% 13.5% (includes in work benefits)

NUMBER OF NORTH KOREAN REFUGEE ADMITTED INTO THE UK

NEW MALDEN HIGH STREET- Heart of London’s Koreatown

35%

Of these numbers, it is thought that around 80% of newly admitted refugees would be housed in council housing in New Malden. The drop of admittance in 2011 is not unique to just North Koreans; the UK tightened its immigration laws in late 2010 with the election of conservative leader David Cameron as Prime Minister in May of that year.

PROJECT FOCUS

600 ppl

2030 ppl 8000 ppl 3480 ppl

1740 ppl

OUTSIDE EU

*all nationalities apart from South and NorthKorea and Sri Lanka

REAL THOUGHTS OF NORTH KOREAN DEFECTORS IN NEW MALDEN

PROMINENT NORTH KOREAN FIGURES IN NEW MALDEN

We settle and adjust to the British culture. It is not easy but New Malden makes it easier with its big Korean community.

These stories are NOT about us! Please don’t judge us just based on these articles!

Stranger than fiction- Media coverage of North Koreans aboard and its implications on defectors

JOO IL KIM- Head Editor at FreeNK newspaper

JI HYUN PARK- Charity leader at European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea (EAHRNK)

JI YOUNG KANG- Defector speaking out about her testimonials to newspapers

The North Korean community is growing in New Malden, we are no longer just refugees, we are settled and growing our families. Our priorities are shifting as we grow richer and we make way for a new expat generation.

We are defectors, so we have had a past full of hardships. However, this does not define the whole of us, we live a new life in the UK.

Joo-il with Gukhwa, Yoo-Ri and baby Soo-Jung

These relatively recent news stories of North Koreans outside their homeland alongside western media coverage about the erratic actions of their government perpetuates the image of North Koreans as totally inflexible, out of touch and generally ridiculous. This may indeed be true for the government officials that predominately feature in these sensational stories. However, there is an issue when

these negative traits lapse onto defectors who have come to the UK for a better life.

Similarities can be drawn with the immigrant Muslim population who are antagonized due to the actions of a radical few.

North Korea as depicted by Western Media- stories of threats and posturing

It is not impossible to find out the stories about defectors. Intrigued journalists have gathered testimonies of defectors in such books as ‘Nothing to Envy’ by Barbara Demick.

The newspapers and defector testimonies are relatively unhelpful in understanding defector’s daily lives in asylum. To understand the day to day, I need engage the community directly! I need to understand the key social player too.

North Koreans in London as depicted by Western Media- stories of bufoonery

SCALE 1:2000

18m

N E W

KOREAN BBQ KITCHEN JUDI HAIR

Defectors and Social Integration

KIMCHI VILLAGE

14m

NOODLE EXPRESS OHAIO

HAN

tre High S alden New M

This is true for New Malden as an estimated 70% of the North Korean population is female.

70%

30%

H-MART

hairdressers and beauty

approx 180

Non-Korean owned business/ facilities frequented by north koreans Confirmed North Korean resident homes

22m

Unconfirmed North Korean resident homes

SEOUL PLAZA BBOKO HAIR

Speculated North Korean resident areas

THE PLACE AGASSI HAIR

High density korean population homes

JU MAK KJ

Although the majority of the population is working class, New Malden has job opportunities, social services and other benefits for North Korean defectors as compared to the rest of the UK and indeed Europe due to the large Korean speaking population that eases the turmoil of resettlement. Defectors generally find employment in restaurants, supermarkets, hairdressers and launderettes; these being the four major businesses types found on New Malden High Street. It has been the case that the vast majority of North Koreans in New Malden would be employed by South Korean businesses. However, during the last decade, North Koreans have slowly setup their own enterprises in the same fields (and other more white-collar pursuits like news publishing but these are outliers to the trend) that has gained them substantially higher levels of autonomy. It should be noted that restaurants, supermarkets, hairdressers and launderettes are traditionally female industries and high expat employment in these fields is not mere coincidence. Historically, Eastern immigrant communities have formed in Britain and America when there is a high demand for cheap blue collar laborers and once these industries become over saturated, the immigrant population are perceived to be a threat to the job of the Western male. After a period of anti-immigrant backlash, the immigrant population shifts to working in laundries and restaurants- cooking and cleaning: industries traditionally associated with ‘women’s work’ and therefore becomes less of a threat to the Western male.

KOREA FOODS

K MART

18m

New malden main roads of activity 1

16m

CALVARY KOREAN CHURCH

TOTAL CLEAN

16m

BURLINGTON PRIMARY SCHOOL

MALDEN CENTRE

DUO ART COLLEGE

NEW MALDEN HEALTH CENTRE YU HAK TUTORIALS ELITE TUTORIAL CENTRE HAM JI PAK

CAFE HOME BENTO

INTERPRIME COLLEGE

JUMBO DONBURI

14m

ZZANG HAIR

THE PALACE

19m

17m

SU LA

AROMA

GHENKIS KHAN

17m

laundry

Korean owned business

approx 420

tuition centres

FOUNTAIN PUB SEOUL PLAZA

JEE CEE NEH

SUNNY MART

YOU ME

YEON JI

supermarket

MAPPED FACILITIES

M A L D E N

NEW MALDEN STATION

‘The majority of North Korean defectors are women, which often comes as a surprise- perhaps because many assume only men could survive the grueling journey across the border’- Joo-Il Kim (editor of the FreeNK newspaper- a free paper for the North Korean defectors).

restaurants and cafes

church

North Korean employment accepted North Korean employment unknown/rejected

JOURNALIST SU-MIN HWANG Rebranding North Korean Women asylum immigrants from obscure victims to radical agents of social integration

As discussed earlier, the public media has a strong inclination towards the audacious portrayal of North Koreans that leek into the public perception of their former citizens. The everyday lives of these people remain largely out of the domain of public interest. It is true that the North Korean community is rather secretive and many try to hide their origin in the fear of social backlash. However, it is not impossible to investigate their daily lives.

Published articles about North Koreans in New Malden where Su-Min acted as a translator

SU-MIN HWANG and I are childhood friends!

My main point of contact in investigating the ordinary lives of North Korean refugees will be the freelance journalist SuMin Hwang who has acted as translator for various articles about North Koreans for the Guardian and Vice UK. She has also been instrumental in pointing me to defector testimonies about life in the UK, specifically in New Malden where she is based, even arranging me face to face access to some families who are willing to share their stories. ME

Roberto Verganti unveils how leaders such as Apple, Nintendo, Alessi, Whole Foods Market build

an unbeatable and sustainable competitive advantage through innovations that do not come from the market but that create new markets. Verganti looking be-

yond customers to those â&#x20AC;&#x153;interpretersâ&#x20AC;?â&#x20AC;&#x201C; such as scientists, customers, suppliers, intermediaries, designers, artists - who deeply understand and shape the markets they work in. In the same way

I must act as an architect that thoroughly understand the inhabitants and users of my designs.

As the community is predominately female, the project will seize the opportunity to put the women immigrants at the center of discourse in determining how spatial agency could be applied to meet their architectural demands. It is the aim of this project to empower the immigrant women to become radical agents of social integration to benefit the whole community of New Malden, not just the North Koreans but also the South Koreans and the wider British Public. It is hoped through this project; the North Korean refugee population can differentiate themselves from negative media portrayals of their government and move away from being depicted as perpetual victims. Rebranding themselves as agents of change, resilient and capable of adapting, even improving their environment to becoming a cultural asset to the UK.

Su-Min

Clarifying Project Aims: Contingent Solutions vs Utopian Visions

To the North and South Koreans, the level of success of this social integration project, if undertaken to its fullest potential, can be used to determine if reunification is still a possibility, at least provide a micro scale case study in how North and South Koreans will interact with each other and how architects could aid their cohesion. That is not to say this project is a utopian vision of any kind. North Korean defectors are the people who are most aware of the failure of such vision in reality. This a project that embraces contingency. Contingency as described by Hegel as ‘the unity of actuality and possibility’ As Jeremy Till identifies in his seminal book ‘Architecture Depends’: ‘Contingency adds to reality a certain concreteness, which avoids the pitfalls of abstract thinking’

The project does not assume that it is a ‘one size fits all’ answer to integration of North Koreans into South Korean societies in any generalizations. It is a spatial study in and response to human needs of the North Korean defector population whether social, political, economic uniquely to New Malden and should not/ cannot be extrapolated into any other community.

Existing support systems for North Koreans in New Malden

There has been a support network for North Korean defectors in New Malden that stretches back nearly 30 years. Its inception set up by a network of a few South Korean Church communities of different denominations who shared resources to help refugees settle in the UK. This would eventually be formalized into dedicated charities in the early to mid 2000s such as the European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea (EAHRNK) and North Korean Children Relief.

The way in which aid has been administrated to the North Korean community has remained unchanged in three decades.

Money is gathered through fundraising and tithing and spent on housing and food for a family or individual for a limited time until they are able to support themselves. The rest of the money (if any) are used to help the families of the refugees still trapped in North Korea in some way or donated to another charity closer to or in North Korea.

This system has worked sufficiently in the past when there were much fewer refugees and fewer charitable organizations but have since become outdated and inefficient. The fact of the matter is that Korean Churches in New Malden and London in general have been susceptible to internal power struggles that have resulted in church bifurcations. The number of Korean church groups in London have skyrocketed almost ten-fold since the 1980s and it has become almost impossible to unite them in agreement of which North Korean groups is most in need of help. In fact, the silent animosity that some groups share makes this an impossibility. The result is a

dissipation of moneys into uncoordinated efforts to help the North Korean individuals and niche groups. This is not an original

insight on my behalf, seeing this to be the case, non-religious registered charities were formed by South and North Koreans in New Malden to once again effectively coordinate the efforts of the well-meaning public. However, after the

initial success of such groups as the European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea (EAHRNK), many more niche North Korean charity groups have been formed to saturate this market and again dissipate the funds and add another layer of unnecessary complexity to the coordination of charity for North Koreans in New Malden.

Ealing Korean Church- One of founding Korean Churches in England, was intially from New Malden European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea conference

North Korean Refugee Relief Group in New Malden

North Korean’s evolving working environments South Korean perceptions on North Koreans and the evolving community of New Malden

The ever growing Korean Supermarkets

North Koreans getting to work in higher quality restaurants and in higher positions

Community Newpaper office setup in late 2010’s

The dissipation of funds and the lack of coordination are not the only factors in the flaws of the existing support systems. The larger problem comes from the perception of North Koreans by the well-meaning, predominately South Korean charity givers themselves. There is a prejudice where North Korean refugees are seen as perpetual victims. In a sense doomed to be helpless all their lives so deserving of constant sympathy and charity. There is a danger that this idea becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy where the North Korean community becomes dependent on external charities and not given the opportunity to rise about their predominately working class statuses.

This prejudice also does not acknowledge the economic and social growth of the North Korean community in New Malden.

As discussed previously, the New Malden defector community has established itself enough to initiate the European Alliance for Human Rights in North Korea (EAHRNK) charity. They have even formed their own free newspaper the ‘Free NK’. tThese initiatives shows that this small community is finding autonomy, slowing weaning off dependence on external charities.

As the population matures, their status as refugees and asylum seekers are slowing being replaced with settled in the UK status, which has significantly less stigma attached to it. There has also been an increase in 2nd generation North Koreans who are given full citizenship status and never experience the stigma associated with being refugees. In general, as the number of refugees become ‘settled in the UK’, the whole North Korean community can be seen as becoming much more bolder, with shifting priorities that needs to be addressed but are largely ignored due to this stereotype. This project does not presume it can fix the drama of the Korean Church community nor halt the inflating number of North Korean charities. However, it will propose spatial solutions to aid the growing/ shifting social development needs of the North Korean community that perhaps would be more deserving of the charity moneys that was ultimately directed towards them but are frequently lost in the bureaucra-

PAST ISSUES AND PRIORITIES

CURRENT ISSUES AND PRIORITIES

Adjust to new environment in UK through help network put together by South Koreans in New Malden

Establish itself as a community that no longerneeds to be invisible. (majority of community no longer refugees and settled in UK status) Achieve a level of autonomy as a community able to support new refugees as well as its existing members

mid1980s - mid 2000s

mid 2000s- now

ON GOING MATURING PROCESS

Main priority to look after yourself and immediate family

Demonstrate the community is able to integrate into existing environments rather than isolating themselves. To become a cultural asset to Britain rather than a second hermit kingdom.

Job seeking and security Struggle to change their refugee status to settled in the UK.

Need for new facilities to address maturing population: First Generation immigrants are reaching retirement age. There needs to be retirement homes and health centres that better meet their needs

MAIN FACTORS OF CHANGE

Language Barrier Establish help network

Established families are wealthier and have moved out of council housing to own their own properties in New Malden, mainly Semi detached properties. These new property owners should be shown how they could appropriate their environments to empower them.

Establish a working daily routine Issues and Priorities very immediate and in small, family scale.

1st Generation Defector average age increase

Majority of adult community reach Naturalised status

children of refugees reach primary and secondary education

The growing number of second and third generation North Koreans are reaching primary and secondary school level education. There parent’s priorities are shifting to support their school lives.

What I miss most dearly are the times when I would sit around the table with my whole family and laugh away, even though the only things on the table were a bowl of broth and a bowl of rice.

Acknowledging the Unique Identity of North Koreans defectors

All I want to do is to call out loud to my father, mother, sister, and brother. When somebody tells me to write down the word “longing,” I immediately think of my home, where our memories, happiness, and joys all remain. During the time I wandered through foreign countries like a vagrant, the time I had to live under an alias, and the time when I had to live like a slave in someone else’s home, I looked back on those memories and found solace in them. It was thanks to these memories that I was able to make it through all the dangers to reach freedom. The longing is always in my heart, and I keep it there so as not to lose it. The power and love of my family is what made us who we are today. I always keep a room in the corner of my heart for this longing.

This project is at its core a study into how the North Korean Refugee community can be better integrated into the New Malden Korean Society and the wider British public through spatial means. The aim of the project is not the total social autonomy of North Koreans in New Malden- it would not be a good idea to have an independent little North Korea in the UK!

I miss my friendships and the innocent people in North Korea. Although we were poor, we were all friends with our neighbors and we all were very close in North Korea. Life in South Korea may be affluent and wealthy, but South Koreans aren’t as innocent or sympathetic as North Koreans. It was the most difficult thing about starting anew in South Korea.

It is to suggest a spatial system that will help North Korean refugees better navigate the social web of being in a Western country but being surrounded by people that look like them but have lead a completely different lifestyles. Essentially dealing with being a minority of the minority.

Back in North Korea, people always shared food with each other on holidays. But South Koreans are individualistic, and they don’t even know who lives right next door after living in the same apartment complex for 10 years.

As a designer for this project, I will be

an architectural interpreter rather than an architectural legislator. By this, I mean that

I will be negotiating the existing conditions whether physical/social/political/etc. and suggesting contingent solutions rather than subjugate the North Korean community to act in presubscribed ways in highly designed and rigid systems. (note that this does not mean I am actively looking for ‘flexible’ systems able to be applied in any refugee integration situations but rather ‘flexible’ in the sense that spaces can be appropriated easily by the user to suit their needs, even if it was not the intent of the designer)

I miss the days I spent with my family. There’s no reason for this besides the fact that they’re my family. I feel guilty when I feel happy in South Korea. My heart aches to even think about my family I left behind, who accept their fate in North Korea and who still don’t know about the outside world. I also miss my childhood friends who were so innocent. After coming to South Korea, I miss innocent people and friendships. Of course, I’ve met nice people in South Korea, but I feel sad that I don’t have friends to empathize with and who share childhood memories with me.

Thomas J. Burrell, Founder of Burrell Communications Group, acknowledge leader in advertising world coined the phrase:

‘Black people are not dark skinned white people’ DEFECTOR TESTIMONIALSIMPORTANCE OF PERSONAL MOTIVATIONS

In the same way, in order to be a successful architectural interpreter, I must acknowledge that:

What I miss most about my life in North Korea are the strong bonds and friendships I had with people.

There has been criticism of defector testimonies of North Korean Refugees as being exaggerated or even fabricated for the individuals to generate fame and media attention. Western media particularly are fascinated with the struggles of defectors in their trouble in seeking asylum or their past lives within North Korea.

Of course, I have friends here in South Korea.

NKnews and the FreeNK newspapers which focuses on defectors have asked questions that are sometimes missed by western media and gives defectors a more balanced representation. The article above particularly, allows the reader an insight into how North Korean Defectors see themselves as separate from South Koreans and the wider global community.

It feels more special to build a strong bond with people from the country where I was born.

‘North Koreans are not South Koreans with a little more social and political baggage.’

But, it isn’t the same.

Also, another thing: Peoople in the socialist state didn’t own property. Because of this, they were more innocent.

Article Source: http://www.nknews.org/2014/04/what-do-defectors-miss-most-their-lives-in-north-korea/

Appling ‘feminine’ principles in architecture

As highlighted by Margrit I. Kennedy in her paper ‘Toward a rediscovery of ‘feminine’ principles in architecture and planning’. It is impossible to define exclusive categories for ‘male and female architecture’. However, it is possible to distinguish between male and female principles in architecture through her research. She identifies that the principles may be used by both genders but it has been noted that women would generally gravitate towards the ‘female’ principals while men would the ‘male’. Kennedy explains: In order to be applicable generally a definition of these principles must, therefore, encompass gradual differences instead of exclusive categories. (the stress in these cases will be on more and than) whereby the ‘female’ principle opposite the ‘male’ principle may be defined as:

As discovered previously, the majority of North Korean refugees are women and this project will seize the opportunity to put them at the center of architectural discourse to empower

them to become radical agents of social integration to benefit the whole community of New Malden, not just the North Koreans but also the South Koreans and the wider British Public. In doing so, it would be appropriate to apply ‘feminine’ principles into the architectural process.

At this point, I should point out I will not be applying the term ‘feminine’ to describe any aesthetic quality of my project. In fact, using the term ‘feminine’ in discussing architecture as object may prove disastrous for any man as it leaves him open to be accused of being patronizing without some water tight abstract reasoning! (Something I am not confident in undertaking) Instead, the term will be used when discussing ‘architecture as agency’. By this I mean discussing the capacity of the architecture to act/to be in its environment.

‘Toward a rediscovery of ‘feminine’ principles in architecture and planning’ by Margrit I. Kennedy was my guide in identifying ‘feminine’ principles. *The embracing of these feminine qualities over their masculine counterparts in this project will become more evident in discussing the eccentric yet appropriate approach to design and research.

More user oriented than designer oriented More ergonomic than large scale/ monumental More functional than formal More flexible than fixed More organically ordered than abstractly systemized More holistic/complex than specialized/ one-dimensional More social than profit-orientated More slowly growing than quickly constructed

THE FOLLY OF APPLYING THE TERM ‘FEMININE’ TO DESCRIBE THE AESTHETICS OF ARCHITECTURE

EASTERN ARMILLARY SPHERE EXAMPLES

ARMILLARY SPHERE PLANNING DIAGRAM ARMILLARY SPHERE Eccentric approach to research and design

The Armillary Sphere is a complicated instrument devised in many cultures of the past to make sense of the complexity of the universe. In Korean culture, it represents their proud technological and scholarly advancements during the reign of King Sejong the Great (1418 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 1450) who introduced politics based on Confucianism with its meritocratic values. Its cultural significance is solidified in the Korean banknotes where it can be found in the reverse of the 10,000 won notes. It is through this tool that we will tackle our unique social integration project. Rather than a technical tool, it will be a narrative tool with our female North Korean refugee at its centre. The object will grow in scale and impact affecting firstly the body, then the room scale, the building scale and finally the community scale. Working in this way allows us to be more user oriented, think more about the ergonomics and functions of spaces desired by the North Korean refugees and in the end build up a holistic system through narratives that would be socially orientated. All qualities that are deemed feminine traits in architectural agency.

WESTERN ARMILLARY SPHERE EXAMPLES

ARMILLARY SPHERE IN THE KOREAN 10000WON BILL

Identifying how North Korean Defector Women are seen by the public

North Korean Community Viewpoint

South Korean Community Viewpoint

Wider British Community Viewpoint

1 2

3 3

The central figure of the Armillary Sphere is a North Korean Defector woman who has lived in the UK for over 10 years. The central circle will show the 3 main groups she deals with on a daily basis and explore just how there people view her. It will be a tool that will help me define the hurdles that North Korean women must overcome in New Malden and help design spatial solutions to empower her to better navigate her envionment. How subtle differences the Woman interacts with the 3 main social groups identified in the centre of the sphere must be addressed in the body scale installations and devices.

Discipliner

As the children of first generation North Koreans are reaching primary and secondary education, it is generally up to the mother to discipline her children if they are not meeting acceptable standards.

Councillor

As the North Korean defector community grows in New Malden, new refugees seek out more established defectors for help and advice. Our woman has lived in the UK for over 10 years so will act as a councillor to new refugees.

Home maker The mother of the household is traditionally expected to be the home maker for the family. This is made difficult by the fact that North Korean defectors are expected also to work a full time job.

South Koreans are notoriously up-to-date with the latest tech. The largely middle class South Korean community in New Malden are no different. The North Korean community are deemed quite behind with the times and unable to keep up.

CENTRE PLANNING SKETCH 2

Technologically Inept

Supermarket/Restaurant Worker

Being a refugee is difficult and requires alot of paper. Having English as their second or even third language, North Koreans are often unable to adequetly fulfill the legal paperwork.

The South Korean Community in New Malden makes use of North Korean Workers for cheap labour. North Koreans are typically found working in Supermarkets and restaurants. Leading to negative stereotyping at times.

Overly Traditional North Koreans are deemed overly traditional by South Koreans due to their lack of technological advancement back in North Korea. This unfair stereotype is sometimes backed by North Koreans struggling to adapt to their new non communist environment

Trapped by paperwork

Anonymous Most people in Britain are unaware that there are defectors from North Korea living in the UK at all! Like most refugees, the North Korean community knows their presence can be a source of contention so they keep themselves to themselves.

Brainwashed by propaganda The British public are used to the sensational News coming out of North Korea. They automatically make assumptions that all North Koreans are brainwashed by propaganda.

MECHANISM EXPLANATION ARMILLARY SPHERE Centre + Body ring Version 1 Planning

NARRATIVE FAN MECHANISM The mechanism will deploy a fan explaining the body scale intallations and devices depending on the orientation of the spinning disk below

2 CENTRAL WOMAN FIGURE The Central woman figure will be static while the body scale evironment spins around her

The body scale ring that orbits the central woman will be a representation of New Malden High Street with several installations and devices that will be deployed there. This shows the initial mechanism deployed to see how the ring could be divided into 3 parts to see how the devices and installations can perform differently to the 3 distinct community groups identified in the central ring.

BODY SCALE DISK

FAN MECHANISM TRIGGER

BALL BEARING BASE

The Fan was chosen as the ideal means of explaining the project as it has a history in both eastern and western cultures. It offers a plane to explain the project while also in itself offering the chance to explore how western and eastern aesthetic styles could be combined.

The mechanical trigger will allow the fan to be lowered depending on body scale ring orientation. It will rely on the folds of the paper fan to retract the mechanism to its original position. It is an idea sound in theory but needs to be tested practically. Version 1 will be made with MDF, metal fixings and easily available media to test the mechanism.

ARMILLARY SPHERE Centre + Body ring Version 1 Prototyping

Version 1 Front View

Ball Bearing Turn table

The most obvious problem with the mechanism is its height clearance. It does not allow for a 1:20 model to pass through its fan mechanism. It also does not allow the centre to expand in beyond its restricted circular width

Manual ball bearings were made with marbles and lasercut MDF tracks to allow for a smooth circular movement. This has been achieved. However, there are issues when the marbles end up colliding with themselves and cause a noticable amount of friction to develope.

MARBLE BALLS ON MDF TRACK

This will be rectified by using a ‘Lazy Susan’ as an large ball bearing, replacing the marbles. This is advantageous as it requires less vertical space and there is no chance of track derailment.

CLEARANCE ISSUE

SMOOTH MOVEMENT

Version 1 has been prototyped and inherent problems with the designs were identified. Although much of the mechanisms were a failure, they were not abandoned but developed further for it to work. It has been a useful exploration exercise into mechanisms. The next prototype for the body ring will start to investigate exactly what the devices and installations are that will be deployed in New Malden High Street.

Paper Fan mechanism

One of the main problems with the disk in this prototype is that it has no quality that suggests that the project is to introduce traditional Korean typologies to UK’s Koreatown. Infact, it does not suggest any architectural typologies. This oversight will also be addressed in prototype version 2.

Paper fans are able to deploy when the cams are working in sync. However, it does not provide enough retension to go back to its original place. There is also a problem with it ripping due to the outer circumfence being in higher tension than near its centre. It maybe necessary to re evaluate the fan mechanism to something that distributes the forces from the cams more evenly with a lower risk of tearing and a more reliable retraction.

Fan Actuator mechanism

RETRACTION ISSUE (does not return to default position)

TEARS LIKELY

The actuating mechanism is flawed mainly due to its lacking rigidity. This has resulted in the whole mechanism failing in reality.

ALLIGNMENT FAILURE

It is necessary to rethink this part of the armillary sphere.

CAMS HAVE VERY LITTLE SURFACE AREA

PROBLEMS TO ADDRESS Height Clearance from fan mechanism Space for Central ring needs to be bigger Track Smoothness- needs to be constant Paper Fan needs to be revised to reduce tear and be retractable Fan needs to allign properly to main structure Cam system in fan actuator mechanism needs to be more rigid to work

UNSTABLE CAMS

ARMILLARY SPHERE Centre + Body ring Version 2 Planning

WATERJET COMPONENTS

Learning from the mechanical failures of the version 1, version 2 employed a system that that increases the surface area of the fan deploying mechanism; employs a hand crank to easily turn the rings around the central axis; the overall aesthetics of the ring has been also made more angular and more clearly divided. For movement of the ring was made smooth with a series of ball bearings.

MDF COMPONENTS

MACHINED PARTS

MECHANISM FAILURE AND SOLUTION SKETCH ARMILLARY SPHERE Centre + Body ring Version 2 Prototyping

Prototype 2 has a much improved mechanical system that allows for a smooth movement of the body ring but also a new fan system that does not require a paper fan but employs a slim frame able to retract. It still has problems actuating the mechanism as the new cam system is unable to translate horizontal force to vertical action effectively.

SOLVED PROBLEMS

MECHANISM FAILURE IN PROTOTYPE

Height Clearance from fan mechanism increased Retractable fan mechanism employed Ring movement Smoothness achieved increased with lazy susan Cam rigidity improved with interlocking frame

PROBLEMS TO ADDRESS Cam Mechanism from rotating ring to fan holding frame

Hand crank needed for easy ring movement without touching the outer ring circircumference Ring must resemble New Malden High Street more with roads being even more evident Central ring needs to be installed in full with a possible rotating element

Cam does not overcome hurdle but stresses the whole fan frame, risking structural collapse

BODY SCALE

ROAMING POST BOX Mapping Extents of Roamer

PAGE

TYPE

REVISION

Councillor As the North Korean defector community grows in New Malden, new refugees seek out more established defectors for help and advice. Our woman has lived in the UK for over 10 years so will act as a councillor to new refugees.

Trapped by paperwork Being a refugee is difficult and requires alot of paper. Having English as their second or even third language, North Koreans are often unable to adequetly fulfill the legal paperwork.

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