Along Yeongdong-daero, one of Seoul’s major arteries, SWA’s winning design for the World Trade Center Seoul integrates triple rows of plane trees on a raised platform with adjacent clusters of ginkgo, oaks, maple, and pine, forming a green corridor that connects the World Trade Center Seoul to the planned Gangnam Intermodal Transit Center (GITC), Hyundai Global Business Center (GBC), and Jamsil Sports Complex to the east, and historic Seonjeongneung burial ground to the west.

Divided over three interconnected plazas anchored in a central woodland, the plan carefully weaves an estimated 423 canopy trees across the site, cooling the streetscape by up to 4°C—coupled with shade structures, fountains, and misting features during summer; and heated furniture and trellises in winter. At a central hub along the boulevard, the landscape connects a planned entrance façade designed by Thomas Heatherwick to the Dominique Perrault-designed “Lightwalk,” a forthcoming mixed-use development and transit center obscured beneath a 4.5-acre deck park dubbed “Greenland.”

Toward the southern end of the building’s adjacency with Yeongdong-daero, the landscape steps down in amphitheater seating, forming the K-Pop Plaza, facing an interactive fountain and event stage overscored by a soaring media pavilion and canopy. At night, the plaza is easily transformed into a sunken outdoor venue for K-pop concerts—one of the country’s most celebrated cultural exports.

Along the building’s northern edge, an underutilized streetscape is reimagined as the Discovery Garden Plaza, a modular plaza with outdoor cafes, misting trellises, and lounge areas staggered along the tree platform, running parallel to a shallow water feature. At the building’s northern terminus, the design brings pedestrian cohesion to the entrances of ASEM Tower and Bongeunsa Station.

Reaching into the World Trade Center campus to envelop Starfield Library, Seoul’s iconic Trade Tower, Parnas Tower, and Samseong Station Airport Terminal, an immersive forest is threaded into the interstitial corridors between buildings, forming the heart of the complex’s new identity. Perpendicular to the boulevard, the forest creates a cool, highly biodiverse microclimate with meandering trails of irregular stone contrasting with the orthogonal paving of the three plazas outside.

Using a predominantly native plant palette and locally quarried stone as landscape materials, SWA’s plan is projected to sequester enough carbon by the mid-2040s to surpass its embodied carbon. Employing sustainable design principles from the earliest concept stages forward, SWA intends to showcase a range of carbon-conscious interventions throughout the project’s 36 acres to help it meet these targets in alignment with the firm’s 2024 Climate Action Plan and KITA’s own sustainability goals.

Junglim Architecture serves as the local architecture lead for the redevelopment, with Seo-Ahn Landscape Architecture as the local landscape architecture lead. Additionally, Heatherwick Studio has been commissioned as the architect for the new exhibition hall façade at the center of the complex. Working in close collaboration with each team, SWA leads the design of the 36-acre public realm and urban forest enveloping the overall campus.