Zaha Hadid Architects has shared photos and a video to coincide with this month's inauguration of its new Chengdu Science Fiction Museum project in China.

The culmination of the firm’s now 15-year-long foray into the country that has produced multiple science and cultural sector designs in addition to the new Beijing Daxing International Airport complex has yielded an over 635,000-square-foot structure replete with a variety of flexible interior spaces meant to showcase the region’s extraordinary contributions to the literary genre and located in the heart of Chengdu’s Science & Innovation New City Pidu district.

The firm says the project is designed to emulate a nebula constellation with a star at its center, allowing visitors to embark from within a ‘star cloud’ that disperses energy directionally into different zones housing its various programmatic elements.

Inside, a skylit central atrium welcomes users into the museum experience as a node around which a series of exhibition galleries, a conference center, and a main events hall with ancillary support spaces are placed. The museum is topped by photovoltaic roof canopy arrays, adding to its credentials as a three-star design under the Chinese Green Building Program.

The museum just played host to the 81st annual World Science Fiction Convention (aka WorldCon) and the prestigious Hugo Awards this month, both of which mark the first time China has been a host of either event.

Also in China, the firm has recently won the commission for a feathery new harborfront cultural district in Sanya and is working towards the completion of the Hangzhou International Sports Center complex and Jinghe New City Culture & Art Center.

The completion of Phase II of the International Exhibition Centre in Beijing is also forthcoming, along with the start of construction for Xi’an’s new Daxia Tower project, which was announced earlier in the year.

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