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With its unmistakable shape and distinct materiality, the 2018 A+Award-winning Shui Cultural Center rises as a phenomenal contemporary landmark and remarkable tourist-gateway to China’s Sandu County. Designed by West-Line Studio — an impressive architectural practice that works exclusively in the country’s Guizhou Province — every detail of this complex structure is informed by local traditions.
Sandu County is home to the Shui people: a small but closely unified ethnic minority group in China. Operating in such a unique landscape, West-Line Studio spent a significant amount of time studying the Shui people’s cultural practices before executing this project. This allowed the minority group’s ancient rituals to drive the creative process and be inscribed into the very face of the firm’s design.
The site is 13,800-square-meters in total, and is naturally defined by a bend in the nearby river. Surrounded by water on three of four sides, the fourth and Western edge is bordered by a serene square with still water and trees, which welcomes visitors and guides them towards the building’s monumental entrance. Upon approaching the Shui Cultural Center, visitors quickly recognize that the program is organized into three main strips, which define the tri-peaked profile of the building’s exterior.
Marked by sharp edges, strong colors and narrow spaces, the first strip serves as the ritual hall and was designed to impose a strong first impression on visitors. While the second strip maintains a sharp peaked roof, it welcomes visitors with less dramatic tones and boasts a cultural exhibition space and reception hall. The third and final strip is the largest, and contains three floors in total. On the ground floor, the pitched roof is hardly apparent, which results in a more conventional open space that accommodates the visitor and service centers, cafeteria, restrooms and offices.
West-Line Studio also noted that due to the strong acidity that pervades the local air quality, in usual instances, bronze plates undergo extreme color changes and corrosion with time. Since the texture and appearance of bronze was centrally important to the meaning of this project, the architects used a 12-step process to overcome corrosion problems and ensure the building would gleam under the sun for decades to come.
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