Binhai Eco City Master Plan, Tianjin, China.
HAO / Holm Architecture Office and AI have been chosen as a shared winner of the Eco City Binhai Master Plan, situated outside Tianjin in Northern China and covering an area of 49,2 acres / 200,000 M2. The plan includes a new Central Business District (CBD) and five new cultural buildings. The project has been chosen as a finalist for this years WAF in Singapore.
The Binhai Eco City Master Plan is the result of a unique collaboration between the Chinese and Singaporean governments. The project was conceived as a case study for a completely green development, emphasizing the use of renewable energy and the direct integration of natural surroundings into the built environment.
The project consists of a new Central Business District (CBD) as well as five new cultural buildings with programs ranging from exhibition spaces to libraries and dedicated educational space to sports facilities. Where the CBD will provide valuable new office space and create a bustling new city center, the cultural buildings will become the educational heart of the plan.
Both the CBD and the central cultural buildings are all designed to minimize energy use, and all incorporate ideas of passive building design, utilizing solar panels and geothermal heating and cooling to achieve near zero impact structures.
The entire master plan sits on a raised plateau, allocating traffic and service to a lower level, establishing the new Eco City Master Plan as a green pedestrian oasis within the larger development of the new Binhai area. The overall plan integrates and merges the cultural belt towards the water with the new CBD, drawing green areas towards the plan’s center.
“ The proposed ‘finger plan’ mimics an open, outstretched, hand, creating an environment that directly integrates nature and living. This design allows the green areas to slide in-between each finger, inviting direct interaction throughout the day and night and creates five islands that house the cultural buildings. The direct access to the green surroundings makes the Eco City Master Plan distinctive and affords its future inhabitants a vibrant and healthy place to live, work and play.”
Via Jens Holm, Founder, HAO
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Project Info:
Name: Eco City Master Plan.
Program: Museum, Exhibition, Sports Center, Hotel, Library & Financial District.
Type: Invited Competition, Shared .1st Prize. WAF Finalist 2014.
Size: 49,2 Acres / 200,000 M2.
Client: SINO Singapore.
Location: Binhai, Tianjin, China.
Status: Ongoing.
Collaborator: AI, Kragh & Berglund (Landscape), Buro Happold.
About HAO / Holm Architecture Office
HAO is a New York-based architecture and design office founded in 2010 by Danish architect Jens Holm. The HAO office is comprised of a dedicated group of architects, designers and thinkers operating within the fields of art, architecture and urbanism.
HAO’s architecture emerges out of careful analysis of contemporary architectural and sociological issues. We aim to create new and exiting architectural typologies by mixing conventional design with green technologies and innovative construction approaches.
HAO’s work has been chosen as a finalists at the globally recognized 2013 WAF and 2014 WAF, World Architecture Festivals, held in Singapore, and this year the office was nominated for Harvard University’s prestigious Wheelwright Prize as well as for the Urban Fellowship at Design Trust for Public Space in New York City.
