Wonderwall Hotel: A Reformation of Old Dormitory into A Hotel with 'Incompletion' Materials

Designed by Blankstudio, Wonderwall Hotel is a 2019 completed project of a site located in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The site consists of several houses and some part of it was once constructed with a dormitory. The hotel owner decides to reform this old dormitory into a comfortable hotel. With 571.0 m2 in size, the hotel consists of 14 rooms with ‘incompletion’ materials to define the concept.

Spaces

This hotel is built upon the old 3-stories dormitory and now it provides 14 rooms. Another new building is also built to be the hotel lobby and the well-known café from Jom Thong, Chiang Mai – Youngfolk Café – also decided to open the second branch in this hotel. The hotel space is designed to be a sharing space, allowing the hotel to operate with the cafe simultaneously. On the second floor, there is a cute little office of Blankstudio.

Design

The design concept for this hotel is defined by the beauties of incompletion of materials with the help of the old city’s gates and walls. Those walls and gates are incomplete but those imperfections don’t mean ugliness. The architect can express the senses of place really well with the imperfections, and also hold the beauty and uniqueness.

Rooms

The hotel rooms are renovated from the old dorm rooms. The bathroom walls of Superior Room are replaced with reeded glass and white-coated walls are chosen to make the rooms light and bright. The Suite Rooms can accommodate up to 3 people with frosted glasses in front of the room, creating sparser and suitable space for accommodating group tours.

Materials

New elements are built up to the walls. By the combination of metal cells and disarranged bricks, the wall’s outline of the hotel looks more combust. Privacy to the project vision-wise can be created and ‘imperfection’ of the walls also can be expressed by putting bricks halfway of the wall. In order to express genuineness of materials, the architect chooses the furniture inside the café, naked concretes inside the building, rough cement-coated wall, and rusty metal texture for this project.