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OPEN Architecture

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OPEN Architecture's Art Park Opens in Shanghai Inside Old Fuel Tanks

OPEN Architecture’s highly-anticipated Tank Shanghai has opened to the public following six years of design and construction. Located on the banks of the Huangpu River in the city’s West Bund, where five abandoned aviation fuel tanks once served the historic Longhua Airport, the scheme gives shape to a new type of contemporary arts center. OPEN’s design features a seamless combination of art, nature, and urban life, “transforming containers of fuel into containers of culture while paying tribute to the site’s industrial past.”

The scheme’s design centers on a Z-shaped “Super Surface,” forming a new center ground sitting below undulating parklands in between the tanks, and above flexible indoor exhibition and service spaces to connect the tanks to one another. Two open plazas and an urban forest merge with the Super-Surface, featuring greenery, water features, smaller galleries, and public artwork.

OPEN Architecture's Art Park Opens in Shanghai Inside Old Fuel Tanks - More Images+ 4

“Architecture is Hope”: A Conversation with Li Hu of OPEN Architecture

“Architecture is Hope”: A Conversation with Li Hu of OPEN Architecture - More Images+ 26

Meeting with many leading, independent Chinese architects and visiting their built works throughout China in recent years has shaped my understanding of their contributions as regionally sensitive, poetic, photogenic, and even seductive. Yet, so many of these projects can be confused as being produced by a single, narrowly-focused practice. These works are often small in scale and built far from urban centers where ordinary people could benefit from them most. There is a lack of diversity and risk-taking. The following excerpt from my interview with Beijing-based architect Li Hu on his recent visit to New York overturned my doubts and gave me much hope for China’s urban future.

OPEN Architecture's Chapel of Sound Reimagines the Concert Hall

Nestled in a valley north of Beijing, a building will soon be completed that may appear to have always been there, or to have emerged from and grown out of the surrounding stony landscape. OPEN Architecture’s Chapel of Sound in Chengde, China was recently recognized in the 66th annual Progressive Architecture (P/A) Awards, chosen as one of ten projects to receive the commendation. The P/A Awards focus on innovative, ongoing work that promotes new ways of thinking about architecture. The Chapel of Sound was noted for its creation of a new, progressive type of environment and its reimagining of an established typology.

OPEN Architecture's Chapel of Sound Reimagines the Concert Hall - More Images+ 9

OPEN Architecture Creates “Disappearing” Stone Installation for Marmomac Festival

At international stone exhibition Marmomac 2017, Chinese firm OPEN Architecture has created a transient installation titled "The Eternal & The Ephemeral" that allows visitors to transform a cube of stone tiles into new, unplanned forms. The project responds directly to the theme of the event, "Soul of City," which asked designers from across the globe to collaborate with Italian stone manufacturers to create pieces built entirely from stone. OPEN's concept focused on the relationship between transience and heaviness in the material, prompting the installation to gradually "disappear" over the 4-day event.

OPEN Architecture Creates “Disappearing” Stone Installation for Marmomac Festival - More Images+ 8

Pingshan Performing Arts Center / OPEN Architecture

The winning entry in a competition for Pingshan's first theater, Beijing-based OPEN Architecture's Pingshan Performing Arts Center has broken ground in Shenzen. The 1350-capacity theatre is located in the city's new urban district, and slated for completion by the end of 2015.

Read more about the project and view selected images after the break.

Pingshan Performing Arts Center / OPEN Architecture - More Images+ 22