Bangkok Bastards and Rural Crossbreeds

You are cordially invited to attend the lecture event by Chatpong Chuenrudeemol:

Date: 18 September 2025

Time: 18:00 – 20:00

Location: SDE4-05-Forum

BOA-SIA points: 2

Please register your interest here.

Bangkok Bastards and Rural Crossbreeds

Bangkok Bastards are everyday architecture created by everyday people to solve everyday problems. From temporary construction worker houses to unspoken love motels to nomadic street food carts, these street vernaculars are scattered though out the capital of Thailand.  Bastards are built with cheap, local, and many times scavenged materials in simple yet ingenious way.   They have been the subjects of Chat Architects research and design for over a decade.

CHAT’s “bastards research” has become the foundation on which the office’s multi-scalar projects have been developed.  Through a process called “Bastardizing the Bastard”, CHAT creates new locally rooted hybrids by crossbreeding, transforming, and existing bastards with other hybrids, newly invented programs, and urban/social/ecological dilemmas.  More recently, the office has expanded its bastard design research into the Thai countryside in its hunt for “Rural Crossbreeds”.  Recent projects include the Angsila Oyster Scaffolding Pavilion and the Indigo Loom House.

Chatpong “Chat” Chuenrudeemol obtained his Bachelor of Arts in Architecture from U.C. Berkeley in 1994 and his Master of Architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design in 2000. After completing his studies in the US, Chat returned to his birthplace in Bangkok to form CHAT Architects, a practice combining research and design, resulting in multi-scalar projects that aim to stimulate community through strategies that re-interpret local conditions. In 2015, he created CHAT lab, a research think tank aimed at discovering new Thai vernacular “street” typologies, affectionately called Bangkok Bastards.