Archinect - News

OPEN releases design for under-construction campus center in Suzhou

2022-05-12T13:54:00-04:00

OPEN Architecture has unveiled the design for a new campus center in the Chinese city of Suzhou. The Shangfeng Academy project, which topped out at the end of April, will be the site of a new K-12 international school and will also act as a cultural hub for the local community.

For this undertaking, OPEN was challenged with establishing a major new urban project while being mindful of the artistic and cultural tradition of the city.

The construction site.

The campus will serve close to 2,000 students and will include a library, art center, gymnasium, swimming pool, grand theater of 1,000 seats, a black box theater, and a forum. Given the variety of users and programs, OPEN decided to divide the school into five individual buildings interconnected by covered walkways. As a result, voids are formed, which make way for four gardens and semi-outdoor spaces. The walkways accommodate large numbers of students, and the gardens act as buffer zones.

A render of the Autumn garden and the for...

The future of 3D printing will be...neoclassical villas?

2015-02-26T14:03:00-05:00

Outside, across the car park of this otherwise unremarkable industrial estate, is a grand, neoclassical mansion that recently became a global internet sensation . It is the world’s first 3D-printed villa. [...] Not all architects are convinced that 3D printing is good for architecture as a discipline. [...] "It may come without economic cost at a small scale but in architecture, if we are not careful, this is at the expense of integrity.”

Previously: Rapid Construction, China Style: 10 Houses in 24 Hours

China's obsession with vertical cities

2014-10-30T14:04:00-04:00

By the end of next year one-in-three of the world’s 100m+ skyscrapers will be in China, as its state-orchestrated urbanisation drive prompts a megacity building bonanza [...] China now has over 140 cities of more than one million people; America has nine

From Tower Bridge to Sydney Harbour, welcome to China's city of clones

2014-06-03T13:21:00-04:00

Suzhou is like many Chinese cities. It has a historic core, including nine Unesco world heritage sites, as well as many beautiful gardens, waterways and temples. [...] But Suzhou has also embarked on another fascinating project: urban mimicry. From Venetian-style “water town” districts to Dutch-style suburban living, Suzhou hosts what journalist Bianca Bosker calls “original copies”: simulations of western landmarks. The city is fast becoming China’s city of clones.

Previously:

Rapid Construction, China Style: 10 Houses in 24 Hours

2014-04-18T12:00:00-04:00

Chinese companies have been known to build major real-estate projects very quickly. Now, one company is taking it to a new extreme. Suzhou-based construction-materials firm Winsun New Materials says it has built 10 200-square-meter homes using a gigantic 3-D printer that it spent 20 million yuan ($3.2 million) and 12 years developing.