CHAT architects

05/19/2026

Thank you, Harvard Graduate School of Design. It has been an amazing term…teaching, sharing, and learning with the wonderful GSD community.

05/19/2026

🙏, Harvard GSD.

04/19/2026

ตรอกวิน...

A Bastard Urban System...Bangkok's Win motorcycle Taxi network delivers passengers where top-down public transports cannot. This particular "Win" MotoTaxi Station operates from a 2.5 meter-wide shophouse alley. MotoTaxi drivers and passengers line up during rush hour in the 2.5 meter wide alley next to Bunnavitti BTS Station. The shophouse backlot at the end of the alleuy becomes rider rest area, canvas motorcycle repair shop, chicken coop, and taw kraw court.

03/29/2026

CHAT to lecture at Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Join us this Tuesday March 31st!

Live stream vvailable in the link below...

A live stream for this event will be available on this page at the scheduled start time. Closed captioning is available by clicking the “CC” icon at the

03/15/2026

The Na-Eh Bamboo Market for the Indigenous Karen Pwo Community.
Rachaburi Province, Thailand

In collaboration with: Yer der ner
Funded by the Thailand Office of Contemporary Art and Culture, The Ministry of Culture
Builder: Chusilp Cheechuang and the Na-Eh Community Builders
Project Designer: Napat Yanotai
Photos by W Workspace

For generations, the Karen Pwo indigenous people of Thailand had lived in natural isolation, thriving in harmony with the forests and mountains of Rachaburi Province. In recent history however, their community, for better or for worse, have adopted the ways of Modern Thai society -- enjoying 7-Eleven snacks, wearing city fashions, and scrolling Tik Tok viral videos-- drifting further and further away from their indigenous cultural heritage and connections to the forest. On the one hand, the community yearns for a return to the deep relationship with nature and natural way of life. On the other hand, they can no longer live in forest isolation and need to economically and socially sustain themselves in contemporary Thai society.

The Na-Eh Market aims to create a negotiation between the conflicts inherent in Karen daily life. The program includes open-air stalls for 10 existing Karen food vendors and covered eating area for customers. The plot on which they sit faces a local highway and contains a traditional Karen ‘rotational’ crop garden in the front, and a locally-grown forest in the rear. A new bamboo market “vessel” is “grown” at the line between these two ecologies.

In conceptualizing their new market with the architect, the Karen community did not want to simply create “food stalls” or “market”. Instead, they requested an environment in which they can cook and eat as a community while “feeling” nature. In response to this unique request, a triangulated bamboo structure was envisioned as a “breeze vessel” that invites the wind. The lower half of contains 9 food stalls while the upper half is an elevated eating open-air mezzanine …where customers can dine and observe local ‘tung’ mobiles moved by the wind…and listen to bamboo wind chimes against the backdrop of nearby forest harmonies. The Na-Eh Bamboo market was constructed by the Karen Pwo community themselves from the plentiful local bamboo forests.

03/10/2026

RQ Apartments
(photos by W Workspace)

The RQ Apartment is the 3rd phase of the RQ Sports Community Development, predicated on adaptive re-use of existing structures and building walkable, human-scaled neighborhoods … over needless demolition/unnecessary new construction of formulaic condo high-rises.

RQ Apartment involves the transformation of a tropical, Mid-Century Modern 4-storey flat. This uniquely Bangkok building typology, once a common urban residential building type, is fast disappearing from the city.

The adaptive reuse strategy involved stipping away decades of building additions that clogged the original open/airy facades which allowed the building to breath. The design revived the iconic central open-air glass stair that feed two spacious family units per floor. The original balconies on the south façade were uncovered and expanded, allowing tenants to sit, eat, and relax… enjoying sounds of kids at the public pools below. Pop-out window boxes – breakfast nook, working table, and daybed - were added to the east and west façades allowing each unit to have an active interface between interiors and exterior. The bay windows push interior life to the building’s periphery, allowing the tenants to visually engage with the surrounding sports community. In turn, vertical snapshots of life on the facade inject add a sense of life to the neighborhood. The earth-tone terrazzo, orange clay tiles, and teal window frames were based on the original color material pallete that from the original 1970’s buildings on site.

RQ Apartment residents choose to live here, not to escape from their surroundings, but to actively engage with its community.

02/18/2026

"Shophouse Metropolis" Spring '26 Options Studio at Harvard Graduate School of Design. Instructor Chat Chatpong Chuenrudeemol of Chat Architects.

First Pin-up, "Local Bastards", complete.

Next stop...Bangkok.

01/29/2026

Chat is proud to be a part of Harvard GSD’s spring 2026 Public Programs and Exhibitions.

📢 Announcing the GSD's spring 2026 public programs and exhibitions, a series that challenges the politics of environmentalism, computation, and urban infrastructure.

The semester's events include "Designers of Mountain and Water: Alternative Landscapes for a Changing Climate," a conference on February 5 & 6, co-organized by the Korea Institute at Harvard, Featuring leading landscape architects based in Asia, the program is related to the exhibition now on view in the Druker Design Gallery through May 15.

Several other interdisciplinary events this spring address themes of climate and equity. Activist and writer Bill McKibben argues in his lecture “A Fresh Start for Our Cities” that abundant renewable energy from the sun holds the potential to transform the built environment. Philosopher Nancy Fraser, in her role as Senior Loeb Scholar, offers a challenging assessment of the class politics embedded in green movements with her public talk “Against the Environmentalism of the Rich”. Wheelwright Prize winner Marina Otero Verzier outlines a radical vision for sustainable computation in “Feral Clouds”, a lecture based on her research into the environmental impacts of digital infrastructure and the politics of data center design.

We're also featuring visiting faculty members in dialogue about the core issues defining their practices. Chatpong Chuenrudeemol, founder of CHAT Architects, highlights unauthorized, vernacular buildings responding to local urban challenges in his lecture “Bangkok Bastards”. Fabrizio Barozzi and Alberto Veiga explore how contemporary architecture can grow from what already exists. Xaveer De Geyter, who is teaching a studio on interfaith spaces, draws on lessons from his career. Jacques Herzog, in conversation with Grace La, outlines a vision for architecture today based on nearly five decades of practice.

The complete schedule of public programs can be viewed at the GSD website. All events will be livestreamed on the website unless otherwise noted.

📸: W Workspace for Chatpong Chuenrudeemol’s lecture "Bangkok Bastards"

01/18/2026

Chat Chuenrudeemol, Director of Chat Architects, will be teaching Spring 2026 Options Studio, entitiled "Shophouse Metropolis", at Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Chat Chuenrudeemol is an architect deeply impacted by the beauty and ugliness of Bangkok. His architectural firm, Chat Architects, focuses on

12/24/2025

Today at Mann Garden's Indigo Loom House - an indigo fashion show entitled "Identity: Sakon Nakhon", orchestrated by the wonderful Dr. Danai Reapsakul.

แฟชั่นโชว์ Identity: Sakon Nakhon โดย รองศาสตราจารย์ ดร. ดนัย เรียบสกุล

สนับสนุนการจัดงานโดย
สำนักงานศิลปวัฒนธรรมร่วมสมัย กระทรวงวัฒนธรรม
ศูนย์การเรียนรู้สวนแมน
ศูนย์ความเป็นเลิศด้านคราม มหาวิทยาลัยราชภัฏสกลนคร
สมาคมครามและสีธรรมชาติสกลนคร

12/06/2025

‘Na Eh’ Karen Market - Sports Day Opening

เปิดงานวันเเข่งกีฬา ตลาดชุมชนกะเหรี่ยงน่าเอ๊