China is undergoing co-living space boom lately, major developers have acquired old apartments and industrial blocks and rejuvenate them into co-living apartments to capture the youth and young professionals market.
This project in Shenzhen consists of nine existing worker’s studio apartment blocks and are being transformed into a co-living complex.
Bordered by three streets, the main entry is located to the west of the site to connect with the metro station and nearby leisure pedestrian mall development immediately to the west. The concept began with a strong desire to retain existing trees found onsite, and paint all buildings white to allow the trees’ shadow to animate on the white walls, essentially, creating the shadow play effect. Internally, the trees afforded the residents protection from the intense glare and heat of the sun and provide soothing effect of being close to the nature. The trees are high enough to be seen from corridors of all levels and from the windows of studio units.
The space between each block was utilized as public outdoor space for residents to play, work and socialize. The lobby and receiption area are fitted into an existing block to maximize the outdoor space.
The rooftop of each block too, will be used as a communical social space with outdoor furniture as a future option. In order to statisfy local regulations, however, providing some vehicular parking spaces and a hard paved vehicular lane for fire-fighting purpose is compulsory The language of the building facade were generated by the digitized image shadows cast by the trees. It was then transiterated as window openings of different sizes. Permeable g.r.c. mesh on the facade, afforded the opportunity to hide the services behind it. Several pop-out boxes were employed at different location of the facade to make it more aesthetically pleasing.