Second Skin by Napp Studio & Architects

Our perception towards any space, person or object can be quite superficial at times depending solely on what is put on the surface...

Architect: Napp Studio & Architects
Client: Hong Kong Architecture Centre, Oi!
Location: Oi!, North Point, Hong Kong
Year: 2020
Design Team: Aron TSANG Wai-Chun, Wesley HO Hung-Lai
Collaborators: Fei MUI, Iv CHAN
Photographer: Jimmy HO

Project's description: A Chinese saying goes “Human relies on clothes, Buddha relies on gold”. In another words, you are what you wear.

Our perception towards any space, person or object can be quite superficial at times depending solely on what is put on the surface. Marble can turn this 400sqft room at Oi! into a luxurious chamber; paint will be just simple. Silk is for the regal; linen is for the ordinary people. Cotton is real and polyester is cheap.

To challenge this extremely singular social-cultural connotation towards materials, this exhibition asks for an exchange of materials between fashion designers and architects to experiment with the limits and potentials of typical materials in an attempt to subvert the stereotype in materiality. Can cold metal panel cladding on building facade be assembled into a warm coat? Can tough jeans be reconstructed into a room fluffier than clouds? In this experiment, we hope to generate a more dichotic if not multifaceted perception towards common materials across the boundary between Fashion and Architecture.

Fashion and Architecture can both be understood as a replication and extension of our skin outside our body. They both share the origin of the fundamental need for physical protection and gradually evolved into a cultural form of aesthetic expression that responds to human ergonomics. Our piece attempts to highlight such similarity in the relationship between Fashion and Architecture with the human body. We challenge the permanence and rigidity of Architecture/building through the temporality and fluidity of Fashion/garment in the construction of space around us.

Second Skin is simultaneously a room turned into a garment and a garment turned into a room. The centerpiece is a showcase of the denim trim leftover directly from the loom. It comes in a form of a “rock” which resonates with the spiritual object in a sacred space- the heart of a body.

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