The Dark Line

Taiwan

Add To Collection

The Dark Line

Taiwan

Firm

dA.vision
Michele&Miquel

Type

Landscape + Planning › Public Park

STATUS

Built

YEAR

2022

SIZE

25,000 sqft - 100,000 sqft

BUDGET

$5M - 10M

The Dark Line aims to preserve the post-industrial landscape in its historical AND ecological depth. Time has produced ecological, atmospheric, acoustic, chromatic and luminous variations along this route, which are the core of our proposal.

Despite this attitude of withdrawal in favor of the encountered atmospheres, heavy interventions were necessary to open this route to the public. The challenge was to conceal the project's efforts to let the ancient tunnels and the landscape speak for themselves.

A single material, iron, repeated endlessly, allows us to forget its presence. Through this material, the project evokes the 2 great phenomena that have impacted the place over the last 100 years:
- the rebars build a new “iron path”, in place of the original railway
- the gaps between the bars show the powerful action of the tropical nature

By lifting and bending almost imperceptibly, the rebars gradually give shape to the furniture, the signage and the protective vaults.

At the start, the decking is raised to leave the old ground intact; trees and grasses, keep on growing through the bars.
In the tunnel, the light source is invisible, sparing the intrados, where the bat colonies hang in semi-darkness. Visible under our feet through the decking, the ground keeps changing: water streams, sand, rocks…

This long underground gallery ends in a high vertical light well, open only to the sky. The sun's rays filter through the layers of foliage of the cliffs and produce, in contact with the vapours exhaling from the tunnel, an unreal atmosphere of fantastic tale.

The second tunnel, after a wide curve, opens onto the gorge. A water mirror fed by natural streams extends above the river. From the inside, the visitor's silhouette remains suspended between its own reflection and the mountain landscape in the background.
Then, following the sinuous cliff, a footbridge threads its way between the highest trees that emerge through the decking, and above the canopy.

The construction method, midway between industry and crafts, is adapted to Taiwan SMEs which are capable of both efficient mass-production in workshops and "haute couture" adaptation on site.
Location : TAIWAN, SANDIAOLING - Ruifang District, New Taipei City, Code Postal: 224

Contracting authority:
PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTEMENT, NEW TAIPEI CITY GOVERNMENT - 220242 TAIPEI TAIWAN darkline0301@gmail.com
Author, designer, project manager :
mICHELE&mIQUEL Michèle ORLIAC & Miquel BATLLE architects and landscape architectes
and dA VISION Chung-Hsun WU landscape architect

Internal team :
mICHELE&mIQUEL : Jerôme Lanche, Lin Yun-Jhu, Maria Fandiño, Giovanna Bartholeschi, Jean Orliac, Grégoire Orliac Denis Wanders, Adrià Fenoll
dAVISION : Jerry Chang, Ming-Hsien Llu, Lilian Chang

External collaborators:
Lighting designer…………….: ARTEC 3 STUDIO
Structural engineer………....: YU SHENG engineering consultants, elements structural engineering associates
Géotechnical engineer ........: GEOLITHE engineering
Tunnel structural consultant.: SINOTECH engineering consultants INC
Electrical engineer …………: YUAN DIAN Engineering Consultant

Building Company: DAO TIAN Construction Co., Ltd
Cost VAT INCL : 9 300 000 €
Total path length: 3 km
Dates: design 2019 / 02 - 2020 / 04 ; Construction 2020 / 04 – 2022 / 03 ; opening to public 2022 / 07
Photos crédits: LU Yu-Jui, mICHELE&mIQUEL
Images crédits: mICHELE&mIQUEL