Elephant Building
Ong-ard Satrabhandhu · Bangkok, Thailand · 1997
The Elephant Building turns a beloved national animal into the massing diagram for a large mixed-use complex. Three towers form the legs and body, a horizontal bridge creates the back, and oversized circular windows and projecting elements suggest eyes, ears and tusks. The gesture is immediately legible from Bangkok's elevated roads and has made the building a widely recognized example of late-twentieth-century figurative architecture. Behind the playful silhouette is a substantial program of offices, housing and commercial space organized through linked vertical blocks. The project belongs to the same period of expressive Thai postmodernism as the Robot Building, using metaphor to challenge the anonymity of the conventional high-rise.