南京三山街万象天地 / Lab D+H SH上海

The South of Old Town (Chengnan) is the oldest district with rich historical background and abundant cultural heritage in Nanjing City. Among them, the historic building of Yunzhang Guild, built in 1895, not only witnessed the development and alternation of the brocade manufacturing industry in Nanjing but also has been preserved together with the surrounding street context until today. 

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To preserve the historic and cultural elements of this historical place in Chengnan, and extend the cultural heritage of this city with a history of more than a thousand years, the Lab D+H SH team cooperated with the Nanjing government, real estate investors, and architecture teams, focused on the context and the historic buildings, and formed a new combination of “Mall + Block+ Historic Architecture.” The design team adopted the method inspired by brocade weaving techniques to organically interweave the major commercial blocks, artistic atmosphere and historical culture, and achieved the equilibrium between historic preservation and contemporary development.

This project preserved Yunzhang Guild Buildings, the Ruins of Phoenix Well, the Ruins of Jiangyun Library, the Historic Street of Heizan Alley, the Historic Archery Alley, and Pearl Alley in Nanjing. Critical and practical questions lie in 1. How to merge a contemporary commercial mixed-use district into a historic district? 2. How to balance the contemporary commercial environment and historic elements? 3. How utilize the forms and spaces of the historic district to satisfycommercial activities’ usage?

Lab D+H SH运用渗透式的手法，以传统丝织云锦复杂的制作过程为灵感，通过景观设计将历史与现代交织一起。主动线上铺设的线性铺装更是宛若云锦上的经线纬线，引导流线，铺装变化、排布疏密、颜色深浅也潜在定义空间的不同功能。精致的水景节点、历史气息的种植池、照明配合在活跃景观空间的基础上实现了现代的设计语言和跨越历史时空的对话。建筑空间从云锦独有的织金技艺中汲取灵感，以时尚的轻编织元素贯穿空间。遵循古建筑尺度，塑造出特色性的城南街巷空间。

Inspired by the delicate manufacturing process of brocade Lab D+H SH  weave Nanjing’s history and the modern through landscape design. The linear pavement design is inspired by the warp and weft of brocade, which guides foot traffic of the street district. And the transition of pavement patterns’ color, form, and density indicates the different of functions of places. Delicate waterscapes, antique planting boxes, and sophisticated lighting design bring vitality to the street district. Architectural space design is inspired by the ancient gold-weft brocade techniques, which emerge fashionable light weaving elements throughout the space. 

A Historic Building

The Yunzhang Guild Building, built in 1895, is an important presentation of the famous world cultural heritage brocade manufacturing industry. The manufacturing process of brocade uses gold, silver, and feathers of peacock to make threads of brocade. The manufacturing machine requires 2 people to cooperate to complete the weaving process with special techniques like Chinese silk tapestry. Lab D+H SH brings the ancient techniques of brocade manufacture to the design. The foot traffic of Yunzhang Guild Building like the threads on a working brocade-making machine from an aerial view. Through the delicate design, the flourishing streetscape of Nanjing, which lies in history books for more than a hundred years, is recreated.

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Adjacent Plaza Space to the Yunzhang Guild Building

The open space in front of the Yunzhang Guild Building is designed for activities with the highlight of the waterscape of the building ridge, which echoes the architectural form of the Yunzhang Guild Building. Tile pavements transition from ground level to waterscape, which is blended into the context and serves as ground lights under the moonlight. Considerate selection of street trees as the finishing touch of space formation of the balance of historic and contemporary landscapes. 

Heizan Alley and Archery Alley have been famous for their busy business and flourishing silk industry since ancient times. The design follows the original structure of the street, preserving the entire historic street space. The alleys are planned and designed as “fast alleys”, which ensure a fluent flow of foot traffic, and “slow alleys”, which allow pedestrians to stay and enjoy themselves. Heizan Alley connects the north and the south while Archery Alley links the east and west of the district. These alleys serve as the main roads of the district to link the main entrances.

To satisfy the traffic flow in the “fast alleys” of Heizan Alley, the linear space is designed to be as open as possible. To represent the silk texture of brocade, Indian blue granite material is merged into the grey tone of the pavement design. Considerate selection of Chinese tallow and other plants provide delicate vibe to the streetscape and comfortable canopy for pedestrians. The shop windows with full of merchandise and historic buildings recreate the historical busy streetscape of the South of Nanjing.

“Slow alleys” are behind the Yunzhang Guild Building, connecting the front and back of the Yunzhang Guild Building and forming a closed circle with “fast alleys.” The antique planting furniture design, multi-layer planting design, and shuttle-shaped chairs enlighten the neighborhoods and provide people with abundant space to rest and enjoy the connection with natural elements.

The heritage and culture of history should not disappear with the rapid urban sprawl and developments of contemporary cities. Our team makes commitments to organically merge contemporary functions into historic context to ensure the balance between functions and cultural heritage. And our team merges historic elements into design language to further extend the vitality of the historic landscape.

Jiangyun Library Building

Lab D+H SH brings historical metal and tiles to pavement design, which narrates the historic stories in the contemporary context in memory of the glorious history of this district. As night falls, the reflection of lights in the tiles and metals in the pavements will bring dialog between contemporary city life and the history of Nanjing.

Phoenix Well

The location of Phoenix Well was at the end of Archery Alley, but nowhere to be found now. Our design team keeps the name of it and implements a small fountain waterscape at the historical location. We abstract the traditional cloud pattern of brocade for decoration. The bottom of the waterscape is made of granite tiles to connect with the fusiform metal water outlet cover.

Our design team abstracts the shuttle form from brocade to design a series of fusiform stone furniture. The fusiform stone furniture design covers the waterscape, flower beds, and sitting furniture on the south entrance plaza. The waterscape on site is linear in general to guild pedestrian foot traffic and divide the commercial plaza area and city bike roads, creating a nearly invisible buffer. The pavements around the fountain spring are under special treatment to reflect the sparkling lights around it.

Roof Tiles

As the oldest city district in Nanjing since Jin Dynasty, the Nanjing Historical South District are famous for its beautiful scenery , busy water traffic of the Qinhuai River, and Jiangnan-style residential buildings with the traditional architectural language of “blue bricks, tiny tiles, and horse-head walls.” Our design team, inspired by the tradition , merges roof ridges and roof tiles as design elements for landscape design. The combination of planting boxes, pavements, and waterscapes create a front plaza in front of the Yunzhang Guilding Building. The transitioning water curtain with surrounding shrubs resolves the visual disturbance of the gas pressure regulating station.

Beauty in Details

Every brick and tile on-site present beauty in detail under the elaborate design of the design team.

Due to limited ground space, public space extends from streets to the roof gardens of buildings on site. The four-story roof leaves sufficient space for commercial activities and provides space for people to have an aerial view of the Yunzhang Guild Building. The rooftop design adopts a design with bright-color pavements and chairs around planting basins. The resting space provides a mix-used space for commercial activities. Green plants and tile decorated walls echo Yunzhang Guild Building. Attractive contemporary arts and waterscape bring vitality to the roof space.

ConTEMPORARY REPRESENTATION OF TRADITIonAL STREETS AND ALLEYS

As a successful case of a contemporary commercial historic street district, the MIXC World in Sanshan Street, Nanjing renovates the historic site and brings abundant vitality to it by binding history and future with deep cultural understanding and high implementing quality.

In terms of these renovation projects of city historic districts, Lab D+H SH interprets and respects history from the landscape architecture perspective. More importantly, Lab D+H SH rebuilt historic moments through landscape design language. In the traditional street and alley, the fusion of tradition and modernity has been achieved by techniques inspired by the brocade weaving process, when commercial vitality resonates with Nanjing’s culture.