+...FaKe HiLLs...+

'FAKE HILLS' by MAD architectural firm

Year 2008
Location China
Typology Residential/ Office/ Hotel
Scale 430,000 sqm
Status Under construction

Throughout China's ultra-rapid urbanization, attention has been focused on set-piece architecture: opera houses, museums, stadia. However these would-be icons are the exception rather than the rule. The vast majority of development in China's new cities takes the form of residential schemes, often standardized and cheap to guarantee a quick return for the developer. Is it possible to build high-density, economically viable housing which is also architecturally innovative? 

This development is located in the coastal city of Beihai, on a long, narrow waterfront site. We have combined the two typologies that usually define residential developments (high rise towers or long, low rise blocks) to create a bold new structure in the form of a long slab. This shape can maximize the views of residents, but can also easily appear to be a monolithic break between the waterfront and the land behind it. 

Our solution is twofold: to cut into the slab, creating a sculpted form which references the shape of the hills that dominate the region's landscape, and to cut openings through the structure, to further allow space, views and light to penetrate it. 

This design also references the traditional Chinese architect's obsession with nature. Rather than siting the building in a perfect, man-made natural garden, our structure becomes the man-made natural shape itself: fake hills for the residents to live on. The design provides both a high density solution and a new landmark for the city.