The Origin Theatre

The thesis serves as a counterpoint to traditional processes of conservation. Architecture is a highly complex organism that is constantly undergoing its own changes and metabolism through time, which leaves behind a variety of materials and intangible elements embedded with cultural significance. In this vigorous world compiled with development, how should we handle the contradiction between the “new” and the “old”?

The eighteenth century has imparted us with heritage ontology of basic principles - authenticity, identifiability, minimal intervention, completeness, and reversibility. Within the natural typology of the hutong scape, the project seeks to propose an idealized restoration to the selected site. To do this, it required two types of judgment, the first to distinguish what alternatives are capable of replacing existing parts, and the second to identify how resilient an object being restored is, meaning how much change it can endure prior to becoming something different.

We have been blinded by the relentless pursuit in preserving buildings that we neglect the values behind that is driving this notion of authenticity. The authorship of legacy is a superficial acknowledgement of yesterday, interrogating what truly constitutes history and what constitutes architecture.

It is through fixing things that you get to understand how they work. The Origin theatre is not only a modernized archive of narrative, but a witness to the process of constant change that challenges traditional assumptions of architectural conservation.

The concept of this reflective practice is the foundation of all possible buildings.