The Garden within a Garden: A High-Density Campus Embodying "Seeing the Big from the Small"
Shenzhen has experienced the fastest urbanization in human history. With the rapid expansion of population, the contradiction between the demand for public facilities and the scarcity of land is increasingly intensifying, driving educational buildings to transform into a new type of campus: the high-density campus."The Garden within a Garden" aims to be an educational complex that activates community culture and connects with the nature environment from the park. The campus boundaries are deliberately blurred and open for sharing, weaving together the rigor of education, the tranquility of the park, and the vitality of villages. It not only creates a unique environment for students to grow, but also serves as a powerful community hub. The urban arcades, the street-corner library, and the playground are open to the community. They revitalize the neighborhood, turning the campus into a shared facility for informal learning and community cohesion.
Fractal settlement design is adopted to alleviate the oppression of high density, achieve a balance between density and scale. By connecting courtyards with playgrounds, microcirculation for sunlight, wind, and sight are created, fostering a sense of spaciousness amid high density. Within a small site, large functional spaces are created: the campus is decomposed into a series of user-friendly learning units with diverse functions. These units are closely connected through multi-level floors, corridors, and courtyards, creating exploratory learning corridors and shared spaces where knowledge exchange occurs naturally, just like neighbors encounters the others in the village.