Recently, the 25th issue of "Yuhe Night Talk" "Art City Proposal" initiated by Weng Ling, founder of Tianan Time Contemporary Art Center, was held in Beijing. "Yuhe Night Talk" uses cross-border dialogue to cover different fields such as art, poetry, music, and science, and intervenes in topics such as urban context and future creation. In this "Yuhe Night Talk", Winy Maas, the founder of the Dutch architectural planning firm MVRDV, shared his ideas for the future green city and introduced their concept planning and planning work in the core demonstration zone of Dacheng North, Hangzhou.
"Build" a green city
Werney Maas at the "Ya River Night Talk Live
MVRDV was 1993 by Winy Maas, Jacob van Rijs and Nathalie de Fries. Vries) is an architectural planning firm in Rotterdam, Netherlands, aiming to provide solutions to contemporary architectural and urban issues for regions around the world.
In his speech at "Yuhe Night Talk", Weini Maas, one of the co-founders of MVRDV, proposed the concept of "green city" construction for future cities, and explained his views with projects such as MVRDV's Seoul Sky Garden. In the view of Weini Maas, future cities face climate change and resource consumption and reduction, and need to compensate for the consequences of previous human behavior. MVRDV's architect and city planner and Weini Maas initiated and led by Weini Maas 2 "Why Factory" (The Why Factory) collaborates on brainstorming on how to build a green city in the future, “We integrate students’ works and ideas with our scientific content, our architecture is scientific, but our imaginations may be ‘sci-fi’, and we need to combine these two points at the same time. "
Seoul Sky Garden
Werney Maas said that when building a "green city", we must first use software to simulate and select the shape of the building, and then add green plants to the design, such as the facade of the building, and then continue to be further implemented in combination with technology. "We need to consider what kind of plants are suitable for planting in such an environment, and then we also need to consider biodiversity issues, such as how many goats are needed, how much grass these goats need to eat, etc. Through computer calculations, we transform our ideas into a spatial concept. "Werney Maas' description is a bit like the high-tech version of "Lego assembly". Just as Lego serves as different building blocks of various functions, the design of MVRDV is not limited to architecture, but includes furniture, ceramic tiles, etc. "We hope to cover different scales, such as even toilets, which involve recycling, water circulation, etc.," said Werney Maas.
Seasonal Sky Garden
In 2017, MVRDV transformed an abandoned highway in downtown Seoul, South Korea into an urban botanical garden. In the 983-meter-long park, about 228 plants were gathered. "We tested the humidity, temperature and water volume of almost all Korean plant species on the roadside, and then recommended the bridge and the connection area of the surrounding buildings to their owners to see if they can give some sponsorship. "Werney Maas said that as the plants continue to grow, they cooperated with local Korean designers to develop roads, connecting the new bridge to some surrounding tourist destinations, allowing the entire area to grow slowly like plants.
Seoul Sky Garden
"Along the way, we can encounter different natural landscapes, passing through rivers and ponds, or entering cafes," Werney Maas introduced. The whole process unfolds step by step, slowly forming various functions and landscapes. The combination has even become a gathering place for people in the city center. Today, this forgotten infrastructure has become a green symbol of the city and makes Seoul a more environmentally friendly city. "We hope to show the changes in nature through such a design and bring some new life," said Weney Maas.
"vertical village" in the city
While trying to bring more green to the city, MVRDV hopes to make them more humane.In their view, large "clip-floor blocks" buildings occupy the city due to population and economic growth, and they are composed of repeating housing units, floor plans and facades, breaking the staggered urban structure that has been formed over the past few hundred years. These buildings meet modern living standards, but gradually destroy local communities and cannot bring diversity, flexibility and uniqueness to different regions.
Taipei "Vertical Village" Exhibition
In 2011, MVRDV held an exhibition called "Vertical Village" in Taipei. "Vertical Scatter" is defined as a three-dimensional community that accommodates the autonomy, diversity and flexibility of Asian urban community life. According to the architects' research, for centuries, Asian cities such as Shanghai, Taipei, Jakarta, Bangkok have been known for small-scale, unofficial, "light" buildings. The villages in these cities have formed communities with close social connections and strong personalities. However, under the influence of population and economic forces, they are gradually replaced by large and boring high-rise buildings. MVRDV tries to maintain the density and height of the building while avoiding sacrificing the personality that this "village" shows. In those installations or architectural models accumulated from colorful blocks, small-scale office spaces, residential buildings that meet different levels, roof gardens, etc. can be seen.
“垂直村落”的“家具收藏展”
在“垂直村落”的设想中，展现了MVRDV设计中的模块化理念。 In 2014, MVRDV held a "Furniture Collection Exhibition" in the "Vertical Village" in the Netherlands, turning the device components originally used for tour exhibitions into furniture that can be lying, sitting or playing. In addition, they did explore modular combinations of furniture. "For example, if I sell the overall kitchen, or the design of a family unit, you can draw and calculate the cost. We have a master plan, such as the planning of the village, and then you can choose your landscape and the facilities you want," Weyne Maas proposed this idea in his speech. "We hope to create such a 'home' where they can go from one place to another and achieve a diverse combination."
"WEGO Residence"
Future technology development has further extended the concept of MVRDV. At the 2017 Shenzhen-Hong Kong Biennale, MVRDV brought their installation work "WEGO Residence". This space "stitched" by irregular rooms of different colors is a conception of future living spaces by Weyne Maas: the rooms of artists, students, athletes, and bookworms have different spatial structures and functions due to the differences in their respective living needs. At the same time, people can easily enter other people's spaces, which of course requires communication and negotiation.
Revitalization of industrial heritage
"Planning and Planning Scheme of the North Demonstration Zone" renderings
At the end of the speech, Weyne Maas introduced that MVRDV recently cooperated with the Tianan Time Contemporary Art Center, and designed by Tianan Time. The "Planning and Planning Scheme of the North Demonstration Zone" designed by MVRDV: a total area of 156,000 square meters of company core area, including a 15.6 square kilometers core area. This is the last joint development area on both sides of the Hangzhou section of the Grand Canal of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. In the future, the existing industrial heritage will be preserved here and transformed into cultural and artistic spaces, combining landmark buildings to build cultural and artistic venues, natural space parks and urban public areas. The Daesung North Demonstration Zone in the planning and design of
abandons the conventional urban renewal model, namely the "renovation" plot, and builds a large number of residential buildings and commercial buildings. Instead, it adds different characteristics to the terrain and history, and is like the Sky Garden in Seoul, connected with surrounding residential buildings, new theaters, etc. "We have divided the area, used water as the vein, designed each bridge and each building as a work of art, and hoped to use technology to purify the canal so that citizens can enjoy more fun here."
"Planning and Planning Plan for the North Demonstration Zone of Dacheng" rendering
Now there are both industrial relics such as steel plants and oil refineries, as well as residential and natural ecology.According to Weney Maas, "We respect the original environment and reasonably limit the height in the project planning. Through the construction of new landmark buildings and industrial heritage, we can better integrate with the surrounding environment, and add water elements to integrate water transportation, buses, slow-moving systems, etc. to form a better infrastructure. This is the future of the Grand Canal." The dense canal water system in the
area gave him inspiration for design. "We will treat the waterway system and design bridges of various shapes and colors to connect according to the needs of functions, such as operating bridges, circular bridges, arch bridges, and corridor bridges. At the same time, there are bridges deep into the water body, swimming pools and water play platforms. In addition, we retained the overall building of Hangzhou Steel, included the factory with a circular path, and made a staggered architectural layout based on the current boundary line and streets, and created small villages."
