Stone Cloud

A decade after it was completed, we can now see Kyu Sung Woo's Stone Cloud house as a project that perfectly represents a specific moment in Korean culture and architecture--a moment of economic expansion when society became increasingly open, just prior to the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s. Designed as an "extroverted courtyard," this influential project captures a period that looked beyond familiar boundaries to new horizons. Kyu Sung Woo was born in Seoul, Korea, and was educated at Seoul National University, Columbia University and Harvard University, after which he became an associate in the office of Jose Luis Sert. Mr. Woo opened his own architectural practice in 1978. He has been widely published and has built extensively in the United States and Korea. Recent projects include the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas and Harvard Graduate Student Housing in Cambridge, Massachusetts.