OBR has won the international competition for the Global Startup Hub in Busan, South Korea, organized by BAF (Busan Architecture Festival).
According to the partners of OBR Paolo Brescia and Tommaso Principi: “Our project connects history and innovation, layering the present with the past and the future. For this reason, we have chosen to reveal the historical traces that shaped this prominent waterfront site in Busan, replicating the form of the historic pavilion with its paradigmatic geometry – yet reinterpreted through innovative technology.
Here, architecture becomes a living organism, one that acts and reacts dynamically with the ever-changing life of its users and the natural environment around it.
To us, the Global Startup Hub is not just a building, but a system of indoor and outdoor spaces that gives something back to the public domain: a new waterfront plaza open to all, where a renewed urban ritual can unfold – a place for the people of Busan to gather, linger, and reconnect, in dialogue with the sun, the wind, and the sea.
This is why we believe this is, above all, a social, urban, and environmental project”.
The competition team was led by OBR of Paolo Brescia and Tommaso Principi in collaboration with Bhujon Kang Architects, Arup and Openfabric.