Rock Office

A lease of only five to ten years made construction cost and the possibility of reuse central to Rock Office. The canal-side site in Binh Thanh, Ho Chi Minh City, also had soft ground. For a21studio’s architecture and construction office with an interior showroom, the response was a system of steel cages filled with locally available stone.

Stacked into curved walls, the cages could be assembled quickly and reused. Their curved form helped resist horizontal forces, while shaping the work and display spaces around garden pockets. Views change along the walls from both inside and outside the building.

Concrete slabs meet the rough stone enclosures. The construction keeps the materials readily identifiable: stone contained by steel mesh, with gardens occupying the spaces between the curves.