a+u Architecture and Urbanism 20:09_600

Our September issue of a+u is dedicated to MAD Architects, a global architectural practice established by Chinese architect, Ma Yansong in 2004. Together with his 2 partners, Dang Qun and Yosuke Hayano, MAD now has offices in Beijing, Jiaxing, Los Angeles, and Rome. Since its beginning, the studio has been experimental and bold with its futuristic designs. Frederic Migayrou, deputy director of the MNAM-CCI at the Center Pompidou Paris, gives an account of each project and the unique methodologies used by Ma Yansong that translates into his designs. Yet, to MAD, it is also important that the environment they built maintains spiritual and emotional connections with people through nature. The result of this combination of technology and nature is a type of fiction architecture that balances itself ambiguously between art…

It is enough to look at Clover House (see pp. 122–129), a 300 m2 kindergarten and residential project – and MAD’s first project realized in Japan – to understand the logic that drives the architecture firm created by Ma Yansong in 2004. Repeating the typology of the Japanese habitat inscribed on small plots, the architecture asserts itself as a shell that encloses the frame of a traditional wooden house – the wooden structure strongly affirming the mark of a tradition, a story, a materiality, opposing the whiteness of the envelope that accentuates the contemporaneity of the construction. Its entire design rests upon this in-between, where the skin that encloses the interior, recomposes the distribution of space, multiplying the connections between interior and exterior. This creates an abstract morphology defined by…

Built over 2,600 years ago, Nanjing is an iconic Chinese city that while embedded in a deep cultural heritage, has become highly modernized. As a former capital of 6 ancient Chinese dynasties, Nanjing holds a prominent place in Chinese history. Flourishing culturally and architecturally, it is home to many heritage sites, with a tapestry of historical landscapes – mountains, water, palaces, temples – as its backdrop. It is seen as a city of higher education, scientific and technological innovation. Over the past decade, Nanjing has been experiencing a bit of a contemporary renaissance. It has become home to one of the country’s largest railway stations connecting it with major cities. As a result, the transit-oriented design has spurred large-scale construction around the transportation hub, forming a new district of Nanjing. Among them…

Our September issue of a+u is dedicated to MAD Architects, a global architectural practice established by Chinese architect, Ma Yansong in 2004. Together with his 2 partners, Dang Qun and Yosuke Hayano, MAD now has offices in Beijing, Jiaxing, Los Angeles, and Rome. Since its beginning, the studio has been experimental and bold with its futuristic designs. Frederic Migayrou, deputy director of the MNAM-CCI at the Center Pompidou Paris, gives an account of each project and the unique methodologies used by Ma Yansong that translates into his designs. Yet, to MAD, it is also important that the environment they built maintains spiritual and emotional connections with people through nature. The result of this combination of technology and nature is a type of fiction architecture that balances itself ambiguously between art…

Positioned on the southern edge of Chaoyang Park, the largest park in Beijing’s central business district, Chaoyang Park Plaza is a 220,000 m2 complex that includes 10 buildings: 2 high-rise office towers, several small low-rise commercial buildings, and Armani apartment towers. Questioning the rigid stylization of our current modern city, with box-like buildings forming a strong, powerful skyline, Chaoyang Park Plaza explores an alternative approach that imagines a city with spiritual and cultural endeavors at its core. Despite being in compliance with the CBD as its backdrop, it is still harmonious with its neighboring park. It is conceived as a natural extension of the green space into the urban context, forming an escape from the surrounding metropolitan environment. As an expansion of nature and classical Eastern aesthetics, it borrows scenery from a…

It is enough to look at Clover House (see pp. 122–129), a 300 m2 kindergarten and residential project – and MAD’s first project realized in Japan – to understand the logic that drives the architecture firm created by Ma Yansong in 2004. Repeating the typology of the Japanese habitat inscribed on small plots, the architecture asserts itself as a shell that encloses the frame of a traditional wooden house – the wooden structure strongly affirming the mark of a tradition, a story, a materiality, opposing the whiteness of the envelope that accentuates the contemporaneity of the construction. Its entire design rests upon this in-between, where the skin that encloses the interior, recomposes the distribution of space, multiplying the connections between interior and exterior. This creates an abstract morphology defined by…