“POR-WOR INTER BOOK STORE”, owned by Institute of Academic Development co., ltd., is located in the old town, Bangkok.
Before renovating, this old building has a water leakage stains and we could not inspect the problem until finishing the design phase. Accordingly, we need to divide our task into 2 main parts; the first one is exterior and interior part of the 1st level, the second one is building facade from the 2nd to the 4th level, in order to renovate and check up the construction inside little by little.
The old construction was 2-array buildings that have different levels. The first building has 4 levels with concrete construction and another one was 2-level building built by wooden and concrete construction. We, therefore, need to harmonize these 2 different buildings into one concept.
For the 1st level, we covered the front of building with wooden tiles and made a partition with a mirror sheet to make it transparent and encourage people passing by to look into the bookshop. We also used the wooden materials as the main element of the 1st level and combined black square tiles that have been used as the main component at the façade as a part of entire bookshelf. The square concept was also used with the lamps hanging from the ceiling, implying to applying the knowledge gained from reading to real life.
For the façade of the 2nd and 4th level, we used the concept of reading a book that the readers have to open, read, and bring what they learn from the book to adjust with their life. The façade will give a feeling of opening a book. We cut the main surface into square grids equally and flip these square grids to create different sights. Each square gird has been flipped every 5 degree perspective orderly. By doing so, it makes the building façade look dynamically and liken to a book page, which is ready to be read and opened to the next chapter.