SHORT DESCRIPTION

The Hotel Resonance Taipei inhabits a long and narrow corner site with a slender precast concrete slab of guest rooms running east to west. The culture writer Dan Q. Dao, writing in “World’s Greatest Places 2021-Taipei” in Time Magazine, observed that the facade seemed to have been “designed to evoke frames on a film roll.” From the outside, each window offers the view of a scene played out by its room’s occupants, featuring actors of all ages, ethnicities, and backgrounds. From the inside, each window frames the view to the outside world, as if projected onto a square screen. The program of spaces is arranged in a logical progression, taking visitors on a journey from public to private as they travel from outside to inside, then from lower to upper floors. The first story, at one end of the spectrum, hosts public spaces that provide generous volumes for congregating and entertaining. The second story, in the middle of the scale, carries a range of hotel amenities for guests. The third story and above, at the opposite end of the spectrum, offer utter privacy, with 175 guest rooms that are compact and economical. The north and south facades feature varied fenestration, with neatly laid out vertical slits of different widths; the shorter ends to east and west have oversized square windows, the most prominent being the projecting bay over the entry. Hotel Resonance Taipei offers a quiet oasis in a busy district, full of heavy traffic and populated by educational and administrative institutions. Making clever and inventive use of its confined site, it sits comfortably next to its neighbors, and serves as a convenient and welcome amenity for travelers, and for passing local residents who are drawn to its tranquility and persuaded to pause a while.