TCDC Songkhla

collage by sauce

Songkhla has become a vibrant scene for Art blending between the old and the new. It depicts a perfect harmony of cultures and styles filling up the town with diverse languages in Architecture such as Chinese shophouses, Sino-Portugese shophouses and modern Chinese shophouses.

With the inspiration from the old roots and new branches of Songkhla, we are proposing a design which has new character to the town but also based the details on materials and crafts that are rooted in the society for a long time. A large percentage of the population in Songkhla and the South region depends on Argiculture field in which the majority are growing Para Rubber. Since a huge amount of Para Rubber is available in the market, the price has been compressed which makes it difficult for the farmers to earn enough and elevate their life’s quality. Our aim is to elevate the value of this abundant material; Para Rubber and utilize it to generate more jobs for the local craftmans.

TCDC is a place of intellectual accumulation of knowledge for everyone. Based on this philosophy, we are proposing a flexible public space with a connection to the street which serves for both members and non-members of TCDC during open hours as well as close hours. This will be a space for different activities during the day.

such as crafts workshop, talks, playground, open-air showcase etc. while at night the space can be offered to food vendors to activate the area.

We lifted TCDC’s membership programs; library, materials showcase and meeting rooms to the top floor while the office and prayer room are on the second floor and exhibition space is on the basement level.

Our goal is to utilize Para Rubber is every possible ways for the building’s design as well as to elevate the value of this material with close collaboration with the local craftmans.
We proposed to use weaved Para Rubber for the facade as this will give elastic quality of the surface to create various ways to define public/ private space and mass/void of the Architecture.

Furthermore, we use Para Rubber also for acoustic quality for the meeting area as well as for furnitures and signages for its material’s properties.

Collaboration with A-Seven Corporation Co., Ltd