DUE TO THE VIVID AND UNIQUE DESIGN BY JONGKIM DESIGN STUDIO, THE WORD ‘COOL’ IN THE NAME OF A BEACH HOTEL AT BUSAN IS NOT MERELY SHOWING OFF
TEXT: PATTIYA HARPUTPONG
PHOTO: STUDIO SIM
(For Thai, press here)
It takes some confidence to claim you are the coolest person. When a Hotel calls itself ‘The Coolest Hotel,’ it is usually met with expectations and curiosity from the public. Some of the questions that come to mind are: What exactly is cool? What does a hotel that claims to be the coolest one look like? And is this hotel cool? Perhaps this is the first thing that makes the Coolest Hotel interesting.
The self-proclaimed ‘Coolest Hotel’ is located in Busan, which is the second largest city in South Korea. The city is a great place to visit during springtime and summer. It can be very bright and warm from June to August, which is why it’s nicknamed the Summer capital of Korea. Busan is a colorful city in quite a literal and figurative sense. It’s busy from being a pilgrimage site for foodies who seek fresh seafood, a destination for cultural and natural sightseeing, and, of course, a tourist magnet for the beaches and beautiful coastlines. More than half a million international travelers choose Busan as their main destination each year. The city has everything for everyone and has lots of hotels, big or small. You either have to stand out or become just another hotel in this city.
Haeundae Beach in Busan is popular for its beautiful white sand. Amongst the many other competing hotels, Jongkim design studio decided to take the concept of ‘unconventional diversity, individuality and showing-off’ and make a colorful mark on the beach. On the surface level, the most noticeable thing about The Coolest Hotel that sets itself apart is the use of bold colors in its interior. From the entrance to the reception lounge, the guest rooms, and the rooftop pool are designed to offer a vibrant change of scenery, not only from scenery in everyday life but also from other places in Busan.
One of the things that allows the hotel to be different is the scale of the project. The hotel’s building has only 12 stories, which house 53 guest rooms. Being a boutique hotel in a location full of 5-star hotels gives The Coolest Hotel an advantage to stand out with its design to appeal to the younger vacationers in their 20s and 30s. It also allows the design to be playful and vibrant, varied across the 5 room types, and different colors between each floor. This is a way to make the experience of the visit different each time, even when the guest chooses the same room type. All the rooms are designed to face the sea to maximize the benefit of the location.
The first floor is the main entrance on the street level. The alternative minimalist modernist approach is different from the expectation of an average hotel, which usually sports more hotel-looking materials like a neutral color scheme and solemnly luxurious surfaces. On the other hand, the bright yellow color paired with the illuminated ceiling panels effectively draws the wandering guests from outside to inside the building.
The reception lounge and a cafe on the second floor are designed with great floor-to-ceiling glass windows to let in pleasant natural light, allowing the guests to take a spectacular view of the sea and letting the outside see the interior space glowing in an inviting hue. The mid-century style is retold here in an updated material and color palette. Jongkim design studio paired natural surfaces like terracotta tiles and rattan ceilings with bold colors, creating a harmonious atmosphere that looks exciting as well as relaxing, timeless, yet new. The slanted perforated ceiling that partly conceals the cove lighting within creates a sense of volume in the area above that allows the space to breathe.
To take the coolness up a notch, the designer compliments the overall golden yellow mood and tone of the reception lounge with the upholsteries in gemstone blues and green. They are sprinkled on the floor to balance the color palette, simulating the blueness of the sea, creating a homey atmosphere and joyful feeling.
The 53 guest rooms all offer the full, unobstructed ocean view. They’re designed to offer guests the best atmosphere in the location. There are five distinct room types for the guests to choose from. Each features a different layout and capacity. All of them are colorful to varying degrees. The playful textures and patterns seen in the reception lounge also made their way to the guest rooms without a doubt, reasonably in a less intense version, suitable for comfortable relaxation but expressive enough to create a unique change of the scene for guests. Here, the designer has applied the crowd’s favorite mid-century style to all types of guest rooms through the choices of furniture and finishing, making the rooms feel super trendy yet comfortable.
Aside from being a literal description of the temperature, the word ‘cool’ was originally used to describe feeling free of excitement or anxiety. Cool often means confident and unapologetically authentic, not afraid to show who one really is. But after all, there are no fixed rules on the aesthetic of coolness.
Perhaps the Coolest Hotel is not cool in the sense of physical temperature or visual relaxation, but what is coolest in the Coolest Hotel lies in being hip and unafraid to be unique, as Jongkim design studio puts it—unconventional diversity, individuality, and showing off.
