Taichung City Cultural Center Comeptition Entry / Williamson Architects

Written by Alison Furuto

Australia based Williamson Architects’ proposal for the City Cultural Center of Taichung, Taiwan aims to create a sculptural beauty that resurrects the romance of the architectural journey through a building. Driven by function, the building’s form is expressed in its own beauty to create not only a landmark public structure but also creating a catalyst drawing people and activity, beautifully connecting all strata of society. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The current trend for the vast majority of significant Architecture being produced today is to ‘jam-pack-it’ with ‘shock’ value.This we feel is only possible utilizing the vast array of computer and technology based graphic solutions called on by the architect when adequately illustrating their proposal.Williamson Architects’ main goal was to breaking this trend. The creation of an intimate passage through thresholds, textures, materials, light and sound, seamlessly combines to heighten the individual’s sensory experience.

The cultural center Is a public space, always open to the people of the city. The ground level can be occupied day and night and is an open link between the City, the convention center and the new Taichung Gateway Park. Open space expands & contracts between the plaza and the open undercroft. The plaza is defined by monumental walls of water, the city and sky. Water frames the new city icon, the Taiwan tower. The undercroft is defined by the mass of the building suspended above, and the landscape beyond. The wall of water is a defining threshold between the city and the Parkland. The building sits quiet; suspended and weaving through the walls of water.

A Celebration of Light

The Plaza at night becomes an exciting new space. Up-lights in the water walls give a blue glow. Occasional bursts of colored light highlight controlled release of bubbles that create three-dimensional artwork as they travel upwards. The water walls are a canvas for projected light shows & imagery. Above the museum, three-dimensional light sculptures are created with burst of mist and projected lights. Up-lights in the plaza create an invisible forest of light complimenting the lit-up forest of columns under the Library. Light dances within the floor of the water platform. The glow from within library radiates through the water wall, out into the plaza. Silhouettes of people in the library can be seen as they interact with the books.

The Water Wall

Moving through the water wall is a dynamic experience; active; monumental; visual; tactile and sensory. Pass through the water and space is compressed, the light quality changes and a panoramic view of the parkland landscape is framed by the building. This view is filtered through layers of lightweight columns. Your preconceived sense of order in a building is challenged. You experience the space is a journey of discovery, the landscape beyond revealing as you move through. You are invited into the building by an open stairway extending to the ground. You are drawn to find out what is within. The minimal building envelope belies the magnificent expansion & contraction of space within.