Daming Gong Men

Xi'an, China

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Daming Gong Men

Xi'an, China

Type

Cultural › Museum Memorial
Landscape + Planning › Public Park

YEAR

2010

The story of the Gate for the Daming Palace National Heritage Park is kind of strange. The concept for the gate was the Idea, that most buildings actually are just existing for a certain time. To make the experience of this structure you actually have to travel in time. So we cutted the apperance of the gate into five peaces. When you move yourself now, at a certain point you can see a complete gate. If you move on, the gate will disappear. Just some pieces will be left.After winning the international competition for the masterplan and the redesign for the Dangfen Gate for poltical reasons a competitive design was build. The client really liked our design but.....Some weeks later they asked us to use the same design, transform it into a different concept for a different site. Just some hundred meters away (the Park is big enough) but this time two of it. We found a different but same concept and added another idea for the base.The client liked it and started to build it. It was almost finished.Everybody was invited for the Grand Opening Ceremony of the Park and just some weeks before the opening, for some poltical reasons, some of the almost finished buildings had to be demolished or basically changed. The client still liked our gate and tried to find a new concept by himself.They changed everything in just 18 days, including: demolishing, re-planning and new construction.Afterwards, nobody was really satiesfied with it. It was just okay. So they build up another (third) gate. Our first FAKE. We are kind of proud of it.