International Competition for Shenzhen's Institute of Design and Innovation

As the final target of Shenzhen's “Ten Major Cultural Facilities in the New Era”, the Shenzhen Institute of Design and Innovation Competition recently announced its results. The consortium of China Architecture Design & Research Group and PILLS was awarded the second prize. The project adopted an “Invitation + Public (Prequalification)” approach, with four invited design teams from both domestic and international, along with five shortlisted teams selected from 37 publicly registered design teams, making a total of nine participating design teams that entered the scheme design competition phase. One first prize and four second prizes were awarded. The joint team of China Architecture Design & Research Group (led by Atelier Li Xinggang) and PILLS, as the only Chinese joint team, won the second prize in this international competition with their work “Designet/Bio-Hill”. Designet/Bio-Hill Nowadays, when subjects are increasingly interdisciplinary, how can a design institute become a generator for future teaching innovation and artistic events? How can we ensure the efficient operation of design creation and teaching while creating a harmonious ecological relationship between humans and nature? How can we ensure that Shenzhen, as the “Design Capital”, will have its future design education hub as the most important public education place serving the city? These questions guided us in finding the design direction for the Shenzhen Institute of Design and Innovation. Convenient Connection with the World Shenzhen Institute of Design and Innovation is located in the “Airport Economy Zone” of Bao'an District, Shenzhen, adjacent to Bao'an International Airport. Leveraging the advantages of airport logistics and passenger flow, we wanted to connect the high-quality international education resources with the campus, facilitating the educational resource interaction and sharing across regions. Rational Relationship Between Building and Nature The design developed based on the existing roads and the site slope to form a cross-fishbone road planning structure. The building clusters with different functions and levels of openness are set up along the hill side. Considering the educational characteristics of design schools and the convenience of teachers and students, we arranged buildings in the follow order: Welcome Center, Teaching Building, Administrative Office and Full-time Scientific Research Center, Teacher Dormitory, International Student Dormitory, Student Dormitory, Sports Hall, Auditorium, Design Workshop, Student Centers, Exhibition Hal, and Library. The reasonable arrangement of nature and buildings provides teachers and students a convenient and independent campus life. The Designet of Public and Dynamic Based on this, we believe that today's design education today cannot merely rely on functional spaces. It requires new types of space for communication and collaboration. Based on the natural condition, we created the Designet, a complex service public space that connects building clusters and ecological system. This three-dimensional spatial network connects programs like education, communication, dissemination, health, and living space, providing various services for campus life and public visits. We extended the public visit path into the Design Workshops and Exhibition Hall, transforming the traditional design teaching scenario to a public display of education. Breathable Bio-Hill Besides the sophisticated building techniques, we are envisioning an ecological campus with harmonious relationship between architecture and natural environment. With full respect of characteristics of the mountains, topography and site context, we discover the landscape potentials and graft the architecture with the site environment. The flexible relationship between buildings and the mountains allows the natural forest to easily extend into the lower levels and rooftops of the buildings, creating a “campus in the living forest” as the signature of the site. Through ecological design strategy, the energy consumption of the buildings forms a sustainable self-circulation system, providing the site with a healthy and comfortable microclimate, constituting an intelligent operating living system—a breathable hill. Base on this, we created five spatial themes: “Mountain”, “Valley”, “Water”, “Courtyards” and “Terraces”, which form a complex and intertwined ecosystem and help the campus connecting with the city, mountains, and forests. This philosophy of human-nature symbiosis and nature becomes an indispensable cultural gene of this site. Open and Friendly Educational Space On the west side of the campus mainline, the important and iconic public buildings are located in the downhill area. As a place for large-scale design communication, the auditorium connects various areas through building space at different heights, making it easily accessible. The outdoor plaza and public space are set around the theater, presenting an open, interactive, and friendly posture. The design of the exhibition hall maximizes the use and preservation of the existing conditions of the mountain terrain and aquatic ecology. At different levels, the design connects the workshop and the laboratory, not only providing an urban-scale recognizable display space but also optimize the process from creation to exhibition. The design of the rotating platform allows the dynamic transition between the horizontal and vertical display surfaces, meeting the different requirements for multi-disciplinary exhibition space. The library follows the existing terrain to create a small semi-outdoor theater. The public space and corridors ascend up around the building massing and organically integrate with the campus public trail system. Different functions are organized around the atrium, providing various types of reading space.

Project Information Project Type: Urban Design and Architectural Design Project Location: Phoenix Mountain, Hangcheng Street, Bao’an District, Shenzhen City Design Area: 348,955㎡ Total Building Area: 300,000㎡ Total Investment: Approximately 2.79 billion yuan (tentative) Design Year: 2020 Design Team: China Architecture Design & Research Group (Atelier Li Xinggang) Principal Architect: Xinggang Li Project Leader: Lingjie Yi Design Team: Zhouya Shen, Han Wang, Jingyao Lu, Zhou Tan, Wenlin Jiang, Hang Su, Kexin Yang, Qi Si, Lijie Cai, Hui Bai PILLS: Principal Architect: Zigeng Wang Project Leader: Hui Wang Design Team: Architecture: Haosheng Zhang, Zhaoxuan Yang, Dezhao Li, Jiayue Ni, Manying Wang, Shiman Xu, Yiyang Li, Jingfei Huang, Wenjun Zhang Planning, Landscape: Hui Lyu, Yanling Mo, Liwan Zhang, Hanting Xie