Golden Print [EN]: Chapter 12

Like many new students, Woojin thought Professor Jo Un-chan was in charge of Design Night.

Being new to the department, it was natural to assume the professor who introduced the event was responsible.

Design Night was a bigger deal at K University than the new students realised.

Jo Un-chan was the only professor who appeared in the auditorium.

In fact, many more head professors had attended the orientation.

The reason was simple: they were there to judge the Design Night projects from all departments.

“Hey, Assistant Professor. Any decent entries this year?”

“Ah! Professor Kim, you’re here!”

Two professors from the Spatial Design Department, Jo Un-chan and Professor Kim Ki-hwan, greeted each other warmly on the way to the judging area. Kim Ki-hwan was much older.

Jo Un-chan started Design Night. Kim Ki-hwan was known as one of the best practical designers in the country.

The two professors differed greatly not only in age but also in their design tendencies, yet they were quite close personally.

“I haven’t had a chance to see them yet, but the assistants say there are some promising ones.”

At Jo Un-chan’s reply, Kim Ki-hwan’s wrinkled eyes widened slightly.

“Really?”

“Professor, you know Yunho, right?”

“Of course. He was in my office until recently.”

“Yunho says there seems to be a spy.”

“A spy? What kind of novel nonsense is that?”

“He said it’s as if a graduating senior from another school re-enrolled.”

The ‘Yunho’ that Jo Un-chan mentioned was Kang Yunho, who had been an assistant in the Spatial Design Department for two years.

Kim Ki-hwan, well aware of his personality, looked even more surprised.

Kim Ki-hwan thought, ‘Yunho isn’t someone who makes things up…’

If Yunho, with his calm and serious nature, was saying something like that, there was a high probability it wasn’t just empty words.

“This… sounds promising? It is promising, isn’t it, Assistant Professor?”

At Kim Ki-hwan’s words, Jo Un-chan, walking beside him, smiled and replied.

“What’s not to be promising, Professor? We can always be disappointed.”

Chatting and laughing, they reached the judging room.

The judging area wasn’t anything special.

Creak-

No matter how much they talked about expectations, the two professors entering the judging area didn’t have high hopes.

They couldn’t help thinking that the projects would be from freshmen who were still learning.

However, the moment they opened the door and saw the works arranged in a row inside the room…

“……!”

“Huh?”

The two couldn’t help but look surprised.

“The work Yunho mentioned… I think that must be it?”

“Indeed, Professor. Haha.”

Even though there were only eleven projects, one was clearly very different.

Woojin guessed that Professor Jo Un-chan had set the theme for Design Night, but in fact, Kim Ki-hwan proposed this year’s theme.

Every year, the professor teaching the first-year ‘Basic Spatial Design’ class chose the Design Night theme.

This year, that professor was Kim Ki-hwan.

So, Kim Ki-hwan could quickly understand the students’ ideas when he looked at the projects.

He could see the students’ intentions and thoughts in creating these works.

“There are about… four or five works worth considering.”

At Kim Ki-hwan’s words, Jo Un-chan, who was next to him, nodded and added.

“I think so too. In fact, apart from those works… we should consider the rest unfinished.”

Besides the two professors, several other people were in the judging room.

Professor Go Seung-hoon, who also taught the ‘Basic Spatial Design’ class like Kim Ki-hwan (Kim Ki-hwan taught Basic Spatial Design A, and Go Seung-hoon taught B), and Professor Lee Ah-rang, who taught the 1st-year basic design tool class, ‘Basic Graphics.’

In addition to a few professors teaching other year’s classes and three assistants who had followed the orientation, there were about fifteen judges.

However, they didn’t particularly disagree with Kim Ki-hwan’s opinion either.

It was clear that most of the projects, except for a few, were very basic.

Although they weren’t talking about it, everyone’s gaze was already fixed on one particular work.

As the most senior professor, Kim Ki-hwan, began to examine the works, the others quietly watched him.

After a while, Kim Ki-hwan called out to an associate professor standing on the opposite side.

“You.”

“Yes, Professor.”

“Would you be able to construct this?”

The people in the room couldn’t help but be surprised at Kim Ki-hwan’s words.

It was unusual to even talk about building a real building based on a student model.

They never expected Professor Kim Ki-hwan, who had a deep understanding of and pride in the field, to say something like this.

But the surprise was only momentary.

The associate professor, called by Kim Ki-hwan, shook his head without hesitation and replied.

“The model itself is well-made, but living in a house built like this would break your spine, Professor.”

“Haha.”

Those who understood the associate professor’s words chuckled.

The model Kim Ki-hwan pointed to looked good from far away, but the size was all wrong.

Having focused too much on the impressive exterior, there was no consideration for human scale.

The stairs were so low you’d have to bend over to use them, and the master bedroom was too small for a bed.

After hearing the associate professor’s reply, Kim Ki-hwan pointed to another work next to it.

“Then how about this one?”

Again, the associate professor’s reply was without hesitation.

“Looking only at the scale, it’s better than the previous one… but construction would be impossible with modern building technology.”

The room filled with laughter.

Like he said, the second project was a geometric shape that didn’t make sense for a real building.

Jo Un-chan smiled and joked,

“Still, the creativity is worth high praise.”

“That’s true.”

“Maybe it could be built on the moon.”

“Heh heh heh.”

Kim Ki-hwan, who chuckled lightly at Jo Un-chan’s joke, approached the work next to it.

The laughter that had filled the judging room quickly subsided.

Kim Ki-hwan then turned his gaze back to the associate professor.

“You know what I’m going to ask, right?”

At his words, the associate professor nodded and replied.

“You’re asking if this… can be built, right?”

“Yes.”

As Kim Ki-hwan replied briefly, the associate professor moved closer to the model.

He acted differently than before, when he was so sure of himself.

“This… a freshman made this?”

“For now, that’s what they say.”

“They didn’t copy it from a real house, did they?”

“Get to the point, just get to the point.”

The associate professor, moving even closer to the model, swallowed hard and carefully examined it.

After a while, his mouth opened again.

“Simply put, this model also can’t be built as it is.”

Kim Ki-hwan didn’t say anything, and neither did the others.

They knew that he hadn’t finished speaking yet.

“But if we gave the students who made this a few more days… things might change a little.”

As soon as the associate professor finished speaking, the room was filled with surprised expressions.

Although he wasn’t a well-known professor within the department, he was a practitioner with experience running a small architectural firm.

He was a practical person and wouldn’t say things he didn’t mean, especially not to Kim Ki-hwan, who knew more about building than anyone. So, his words must be true.

Kim Ki-hwan, who had been silent, spoke again.

“Do you know that?”

“Yes?”

“The land registry I included as an appendix to the competition theme this time.”

“Yes, Professor.”

“That was taken from an actual land registry in Gyeonggi Province.”

Land is divided into different types based on how it can be used.

There are big categories like land and forest, and then smaller categories within ‘land’ for different purposes.

The ‘Cadastral Map’ shows how land is divided into plots and where the boundaries are.

That’s why Kim Ki-hwan included the land registry in the competition rules.

He wanted them to understand the surrounding environment through the land registry and design a building that suited it.

Even though Kim Ki-hwan wanted them to use the land registry, he didn’t expect this.

“But as I’m looking at this model now… I’ve found something quite interesting.”

The associate professor asked back with a curious expression.

“Interesting, you say…?”

Tap tap-

Kim Ki-hwan, tapping the stand on which the model was placed, smiled and opened his mouth.

“The plot I presented to the students is a Zone 2 residential area, right?”

The pointer Kim Ki-hwan was holding moved towards the architectural model.

“If you just guess the size, it looks like the building size is exactly right for the land.”

Kim Ki-hwan cared a lot about real-world building and experience. He didn’t think new students, who didn’t know much, would design a model that followed the building rules for that land.

Even older students would find it hard to design something so practical.

But this model in front of him seemed to have all those things right, which was very strange.

It was as if the design was carefully planned to fit the land rules.

“Could it be a coincidence?”

At Kim Ki-hwan’s question, the associate professor nodded without a moment’s hesitation.

“Of course.”

“Hmm….”

“Even the 3rd graders don’t do their assignments like that. It must have just happened to fit well.”

The people in the room nodded at the associate professor’s words.

Kim Ki-hwan also nodded, but his inner thoughts were a little different.

‘A coincidence… Even so, they really used the land in the best way possible…’

Kim Ki-hwan, glancing once at the ‘Room 202’ sticker attached to the model, chuckled to himself.

Even while thinking it was impossible, his instinct was telling him that building codes had been considered in the making of this architectural model.

“Well, it’s not that important, I suppose.”

Kim Ki-hwan chuckled again and continued.

“It looks like we already know who will win the scholarship this year.”

“That’s right.”

At Kim Ui-hwan’s words, everyone in the room slowly nodded.

It wasn’t just because he was the oldest professor in the room.

Everyone could tell that the best project for Design Night was already clear, even at the start of judging.

Kim Ki-hwan, glancing at the model one more time, smirked and added a word.

“Maybe this year will be a little interesting.”

Golden Print