Naju-si Awarded 'Best' in Design and 'Excellence' in Landscape Administration

Naju City, Jeollanam-do (Mayor Yoon Byung-tae) announced on the 14th that it won the Grand Prize in the 8th Eco-friendly Public Design Contest and the Excellence Award in the Landscape Administration Evaluation.

The eco-friendly public design contest, hosted by Jeollanam-do, selects and awards outstanding cases of eco-friendly spaces and creative architectural designs where nature, culture, and people coexist, targeting cities and counties within the province.

Mayor Yoon Byung-tae and employees of the Urban Department (Landscape Design Team) are taking a commemorative photo for the award.
[Photo by Naju City]

Jeollanam-do conducted a first-round document screening and on-site evaluation by external experts for the 22 cases submitted by cities and counties.

The city submitted the case of the ‘Naju Culture and Arts Communication Creation Center,’ a remodeled building of the former Fruit Cooperative located in Juklim-dong through an urban regeneration project, winning the Grand Prize.

This marks the second consecutive year of awards following last year’s Excellence Award for the Geumseongsan Ecological Forest case.

The building, established in the 1920s during the Japanese colonial period, was highly praised for preserving and reproducing the exterior without completely demolishing it, maintaining its historical significance and rarity, and refurbishing the interior space using some of the original materials.

The Creation Center serves as an exhibition and experience space for residents to enjoy cultural content and is also used as accommodation (guesthouse) for external tourists and artists.

Notably, from July to November, it operated as an art creation and exhibition space for six domestic and international artists participating in the 8th term of the ‘International Residence’ project.

In the Jeollanam-do Landscape Administration Evaluation, the city won the Excellence Award by submitting the ‘Naju Eupseong Earthen Stone Wall Construction Project.’

The evaluation was based on combined scores from the first-round document review and second-round on-site inspection across three fields and ten items (21 indicators) related to landscape and public design promotion tasks.

The city received high marks for strengthening expertise by reallocating dedicated personnel for public design within the department alongside revising the landscape plan this year.

Particularly, the Naju Eupseong earthen stone wall, the subject of the on-site evaluation, attracted attention for rebuilding the old earthen stone walls in the eupseong area, creating a resting garden in the vacant lot, and providing a premium pedestrian path, night view, and comfortable resting space for residents and tourists fitting the millennium-old magistrate town.

Mayor Yoon Byung-tae said, “The Culture and Arts Communication Creation Center and the Naju Eupseong Earthen Stone Wall Road are excellent examples of landscape maintenance that combine outstanding aesthetics and practicality. We will do our best to make Naju a place people want to visit again through the promotion of beautiful and dignified landscape projects and the discovery of contest projects.”

Naju = Kim Yuk-bong, Honam Reporting Headquarters, Asia Economy baekok@asiae.co.kr