This urban renewal project is located in Qujiang, northwest China’s Xi'an City. The site was originally a square and urban green belt. The architecture interior was a two-storey parking lot. The square, made of covered earth in the later period, was encircled by urban roads. The vicinity was mainly composed of office buildings and residential communities.
Skirting the interior space in the front, we may pick up the steps to go up along the stepped platform that extends from the bottom to the top to reach an open platform. It is a leisure facility, and a site to enjoy the sight of a panoramic view. More interestingly, it is where intersections of wider scales and more diverse latitudes take place.
Its simplicity and cleanliness are more reflected in the appearance, shape, material and the symbiotic relationship with the surrounding environment, which benefits from the concept that the designer has been sticking to. Unlike the eye-catching architectural styles, Gu Teng points to the other extreme. Since risk and visual durability are not fully guaranteed, he avoids going for fancy expressiveness, but gives all meaning to more succinct expression, i.e. know how to do subtraction.
When we pass through buildings of similar types along the road, and all of a sudden enter the space from a corner of the lawn, it may feel we are crossing the space in a flash. It is comfortable and natural, keeps the line, and stimulates people’s infinite imagination and delights.
All the information about how to enter the 2020 WAN Awards is here.
We are very happy to offer support so please don’t hesitate to email Georgia, WAN Awards Event Coordinator with any questions at Georgia.Baily@haymarket.com.
Last year more than 40 countries took part in the WAN Awards with strong showings from Europe, the Americas and Asia-Pacific. And we saw some truly outstanding projects, take a look at the winners from last year here.