UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS ARLINGTON | Studio Leader : Joshua Nason Seoul, Skin Deep investigates the surfaces of Seoul as its “common ground” ？ the physical element acting as medium for the collective city. Often overlooked, the essential nature of city surface is as canvas on which the city is painted, a geological/biological/formal beginning of human habitation. Students gathered evidence of Seoul’s understanding its surfaces as essential space: resources to better the city and identify the layered and integrated nature of contemporary urban living. City surfaces are both active and deep ？ a stratifiable medium for new public space. These surfaces constantly refine the redefine types of uses for public space as collective ground. The semester began by cataloging space, materiality, use, and methods of making in order to explore the potentials found within the rethinking of surface as actionable medium. This, coupled with research on Seoul, generated process/practice overlaps that revealed the ground’s inherent connectivity. Students investigated three types of surface in Seoul: Infrastructural Ground, Architectural Ground, and Collective (public) Ground. Students reinterpreted and applied lessons from within the city to activate and appropriate space for public life in new ways. Projects propose new types of strategic, activity-scaled public spaces aimed at linking citizens to their neighborhood in meaningful, experiential ways.