TreeO'clock is a micro mixed-use space, integrating a restaurant and bar, gallery, workshop, health studio, and juristic office for Villa Qabalah residences in Phuket, Thailand. The placemaking shares our team's endeavor as Phuket locals and involves the developer and future residents to achieve collective actions committed to gentling urban adaptation through vegetative restoration, space-sharing economy, community cohesion, and responsible occupancy.

CONTEXT & CHALLENGES
With free-market opportunism and economic policies popularizing tourism and long-term residency, Phuket’s former agricultural landscape has rapidly transformed into urban sprawl as the regulations permits development in these zones for buildings under 12-meter height, resulting in the loss of treescape, changeover to non-native ownership, and dissociated community from socio-economic difference.

APPROACH
Our young firm, as hometowners, felt entitled to address the footprint of accelerated urban sprawl and to reconcile a sustainable community alongside tourism-economic progress.

Reconfiguring Green Areas:
Pursuing restoration of treescape to the lifeless site, tree-plantable plots, in addition to on-ground regulatory requirements, are elevated to rooftops of TreeO’clock and every villa. Crowning vegetation facilitates vertical growth uninhibited by height limitations and maximizes strategic outdoor recreational spaces. Rooftop green coverage favors the building’s efficient conditioning–with organic insulation and solar filter, benefiting from year-round tropical rain, to ease the use of active and renewable energy. TreeO’clock has revived 40% of tree-plantable areas while efficiently managing land use.

Developing Sustainability through Adaptive Use:
Programming for a mixed-use pivots on versatile architectural attributes—such as alternative entryways, terrazzo and sandwash amphitheater staircases, and transitions of floor levels—enabling scalability for 
its most regular uses. The adaptability allows productive repurposing to feature hospitality services and cultural events, from art exhibitions, wellness activities, to tasting events hosted since its opening. Its independence as a sharable venue unburdens the residents from this building’s maintenance fees.

Embracing Non-exclusivity to Foster a Sense of Community:
Multi-functionality and availability to public challenges accustomed values of housing developments in Phuket, often gated and self-contained. TreeO’clock as a communal nexus unlocks opportunities for new and local residents to develop a sense of belonging. The commercial services bring a lively atmosphere and promote safety to the municipal roads. Peripheral corners—often claimed for saleable land extensions—are dedicated to creating landscape aesthetics and transitional space to local byway, favoring gate-free management. As residents and developer enjoy maximized softscape spaces, they are encouraged to contribute participatory services to their greenery.