Here, we ask designers to take a selfie and give us an inside look at their life.
Occupation: Architects, Founders of YUN Architecture
Instagram: @yunarchitecture
Hometown: Brooklyn, NY
Studio Location: DUMBO, Brooklyn
Describe what you make: YUN creates spaces that prioritize design, enduring solutions, refined execution, and sustainable building technologies. Our work consists mainly of residential, cultural, and commercial projects that are highly crafted, elevated, customized, and tailored to each individual owner’s goals.
The most important thing you’ve designed to date: While all of our projects are deeply significant to us, we recently completed a large townhouse renovation that was designed to certified Passive House standards. Across the entire experience of working on this project—from the implementation of all the technical aspects to understanding and bringing to life our client’s unique vision—we were able to create an environment that was both expertly crafted and high performing, and reflected the homeowner’s story and sensibilities.
Another exciting component of our work here was finding ways to spotlight the owner’s incredible art collection throughout the home. Our strategy helped to showcase their collection, which is rewarding to see in its completed form.
Describe the problem your work solves: We investigate spatial challenges and find creative design solutions to solve problems across an array of built environments—residential, commercial, or institutional—working in close collaboration with our clients and a talented roster of craftspeople, contractors, suppliers, and other partners to create elevated, tailored, and enduring spaces.
Share the project you are working on now: We are currently working as the associate design architects on the revitalization of the Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden with Hiroshi Sugimoto and his architecture office, New Material Research Laboratory. This complex project calls for the reorganization of the existing garden to allow for a wider range of art to be displayed, and creates added opportunities for large-scale contemporary works and performances, as well as more intimate spaces for the museum’s existing modern masterpieces.
What you absolutely have to have in your studio: Natural light, plants, and a lot of coffee. We use a lot of natural materials in our projects, so there is usually a range of samples in our studio: lots of natural wood, beautiful stone that is honed, flamed and split faced, exquisite hand-finished metals like brass and bronze, tadelakt and shikkui plaster (stunning, and an incredible option for CO2 absorption), and hand-formed tiles of all sorts. Our walls are covered with full-scale drawings and detail mock ups, allowing us to really lean into the nuance of a project and capture the correct scale and proportion of a curve, joint, reveal, overlap, etc. before it is fabricated.
What you do when you’re not working: When we’re able, we like to travel and broaden our creative and cultural vocabulary. There’s nothing quite like immersing yourself in the architecture and art of an entirely new place. Some of our favorites include Rome, Paris, Vienna, Helsinki, Berlin, and Copenhagen. When we are home in Brooklyn, we like to read, garden, cook, and spend time with our family and friends.
Sources of creative envy (dead or alive): There’s not enough space to list them all. We love classical architectural masterpieces for their permanence, use of stone, and dedication to craft.
Modern architects like Le Corbusier, Charlotte Perriand, Mies van der Rohe, Alvar Aalto, Eero Saarinen, Louis Khan, Gordon Bunshaft, and contemporary architects like Tadao Ando, David Chipperfield, Peter Zumthor, Herzog & De Meuron, and Tom Phifer & Partners, all inspire us and our practice.
The distraction you want to eliminate: Visual clutter. We like to put the phones down and get lost in a good book. It’s a nice mental palate cleanser.
Concrete or marble? Marble, because of its enduring unique beauty and natural artistry. Sandblasted concrete is a close second.
High-Rise Or Townhouse? While we love a good high-rise project, townhouses have a way of presenting more opportunity to push and expand spatial configurations, which we love.
Remember Or Forget? Remember, and learn from it.
Aliens Or Ghosts? Aliens, hopefully they will enlighten us.
Dark Or Light? Light—and specifically tunable light (a firm favorite), which mimics natural daylight cycles and supports circadian rhythms and overall wellbeing throughout a space.
