Keunyoung Lim (MArch ’19) Won Seoul Metropolitan Government’s Cheonggyecheon Public Art Project Design Competition
Keunyoung Lim (MArch ’19), director of SS2 Architects , led the design of Cheonggye Yu-Seok, a public art and urban installation situated along Seoul’s Cheonggyecheon Stream, a historic public space with over 600 years of history, which welcomes more than 50,000 visitors daily.
Cheonggye Yu-Seok was the winning entry in the Creative Cheonggye category of the 2025 Cheonggyecheon Public Art Project Design Competition, organized by the Seoul Metropolitan Government in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the Cheonggyecheon Restoration.
Cheonggye Yu-Seok reimagines public art as an architectural and ecological interface, integrating material memory, environmental process, and civic reflection. The work is composed of recycled aluminum cubes, each made by compressing aluminum scraps reclaimed from manufacturing and construction processes. Resting on the surface of the stream, the installation responds to light, water, and seasonal change, gradually weathering into a stone-like presence. Designed to exist temporarily before being recycled again, the project invites reflection on how architecture and art can engage public space through material cycles, environmental change, and collective memory.
Cheonggye Yu-Seok has drawn wide public attention, highlighting Seoul’s evolving dialogue between culture, ecology, and urban transformation.
Photos courtesy of Keunyoung Lim.
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