Building a temple of Won Buddhism that is based on Mahayana Buddhism in Cambodia, the Hinayana Buddhist country, makes me consider the relationship between religion and architecture as a whole. In addition, the meeting of the symbol of the religious buildings and local traditions was something to be considered. The architecture style changes have come from combining religious style with traditions from Hinduism and Buddhism. Won Buddhism is relatively new, having a mere 100 years of history, and does not have a striking architectural symbol or style. Rather than focusing on this drawback, Won Buddhism has linked itself to Khmer culture. In previous works with Won Buddhism, it is clear that religious architectural style cannot simply be set and shaped with a proclamation alone; on the contrary, developing for a religion toward a real architectural style takes a considerable amount of time. Therefore, it must be started with respect to histories and philosophies.
Religious space is the place of gathering people. A place that provides shade is the most suitable place for people to gather in hot tropical regions. The shade from a large roof, like a parasol, will encourage people to gather. If the space is not completely closed, it will be comfortable without air conditioning. The main purpose of the temple is religious, not residential, so it was decided to loosely divide the space into indoor and outdoor sections. The focus of the architecture was to create expression that is familiar to Cambodian Won Buddhists, not for the convenience of clerics. It was decided that local materials would be used to build the temple, not only because of financial constraints, but also to make the temple look familiar to local people.
The existing facilities are presently common results. However, the new temple can be regarded as a new analysis of natural features. Carrying out a new project in a place with a completely different landscape and climate cannot sustain trial and error. The knowledge and expectation of a hot tropical zone was just a preconception. Architecture is both building onto a landscape and making the landscape.
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