Tongji Architectural Design and Research Institute: The Latest Architecture and News

When architecture has been evolving within the context of “Chinese characteristics”, Shanghai as one of the national creative centers provides us with a glimpse of the transformations and the prospects of Chinese contemporary architecture. As a matter of fact, corporations are the main actors in shaping Shanghai’s cityscape, among which state-owned design groups play a significant role. As the chief architect of Tongji Architectural Design, Zeng Qun stays in the core of an institutional power with many large-scale built projects and has been experiencing the evolving of contemporary architecture in China. In the following excerpt from a conversation between Zeng Qun and the author, he talks about the corporation situation, the development process, the personal standpoint, and more.

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Videos

Currently on display at the Aedes Architecture Forum Berlin, "ZÀI XĪNG TǓ MÙ: Sixteen Chinese Museums, Fifteen Chinese Architects," takes an in-depth look at China’s recent museum boom and its effects on the socio-political and cultural landscape of modern China.

As part of the exhibition, filmmaker Moritz Dirks sat down with 16 of the top architects working in China today, including Wang Shu, Dang Qun of MAD Architects, and Zhu Pei of Studio Pei-Zhu, to discuss the challenges of creating cultural spaces that relate both to the global, digital, urban contexts of the contemporary world and to the strong heritage and identity of Chinese culture.

Continue after the break for the 16 interviews.

A team comprised of Moore Ruble Yudell (MRY), Tongji Architectural Design and Research Institute and SWA Landscape have proposed the winning design for the new College of Architecture and Design at Wenzhou-Kean University in Wenzhou, China. Their design is made up of a series of rectangular volumes, at the core of which lies a large forum, central to both the building and the university as a whole. Prominently sited at the entrance to the campus, the new College presents a grand portico to welcome visitors into the university through the formal entry quad.

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