Urban Umbrellas

North Sichuan Road City Complex

Environment and Architecture Design Coursework
Institute: Tongji University
Time: February.2018 - June. 2018
Design Team: Jiaqi Wang & Xiyan Yang
Project location: Shanghai, China

Context

North Sichuan Road was once a bustling high street in Shanghai, characterized by clusters of local household businesses and vendors, and a vibrant public life. However, in recent decades, the rise of online shopping has led to a decline in local businesses, exacerbated by the trend of gentrification and the privatization of public space. The informal spaces for local community have been shrinken due to the expansion of such luxury commerical districts.

Located at the north end of North Sichuan Road, this project is at the frontline of such conflict. Thus, our project hopes to respond to such a challenge by integrating a more inclusive public space into the requested commercial function. By doing so, we hope that the area’s once-thriving public life can be reseen in this district in a new form.

Concept

In our design, we go beyond the initial project mission by creating a continuous timber structure around the podium of the two towers. These timber structures provide shade and shelter that adapt to more flexible use of space in contrast to other commercial areas commonly seen in Shanghai.

Such structure allows for mutiple usage of the space. Under these timber structures, tracks, sports fields, skate parks, and multiple “public cubes” that could be used to host community events and provide shelter for the homeless are proposed. Additionally, we extended the umbrellas across the river to create a more seamless connection between the green space and the surrounding urban fabric. Together, these elements form a new urban park we call the “Urban Umbrellas” that accommodate more possibility for different informal and grassroot activties in the city.