Location: Aranya, Qinhuangdao
Scope: Architecture,
Interiors, Landscape
Type: Renovation
Total floor area: 650㎡
Site area: -㎡
Max height: 6.3m
Design: 2021
Completed: 2021
Photography: Arch-Exist Photography
Video: PLAT ASIA ndn lab
Descriptions
The project site located
in front of an original locust forests at the southern edge of Aranya,
Qinhuangdao. Clients have already constructed a black steel frame structure on
site, filled with glass, a double-slope roof covered by tent cloth with a max height
of 6.3 meters, which stand on a rectangular concrete base.
The architect is
designated to renovate it into a restaurant operated by Zhenziwei seafood
hotpot, which is selected in “2022 Black Pearl Restaurant Guide.” This is
Zhenziwei’s first branch that outside of Beijing. Thus it would redefine the
image of the brand.
In terms of the site
environment, pre-existing structure, low cost, and short construction period,
the architect rethink the principles of design under the necessary and
insufficient conditions, aims at a flexible layout, a stronger connection
between people and nature, rather than a single interiors design.
Place from forest
The origin forest is a
crucial role
that could define the context. At the end of the axis of the forest, without a
complex interaction means, the primitive surroundings and sense of place let
architect to decide build a strong connection between forest and space. The
landscape, spatial layout, scale and density were also kept sequence
accordingly.
Back to the original
vistas
To achieve design
strategy, build an architecture as a part of nature, architect intend to extend
primitive forest to surrounding building, planting the locust trees, hawthorn
trees, and turfgrasses and Pennisetum. The approach path was zigged twice, and
a stone monolith sit in the end of the vista to create a scenery and let guests
prepare for deep into the nature.
A duo of parallel planes
The architect selects
simple planes to control the spatial scale and layout; it also connect with the
nature in the horizon view. Inspired by the eave-a special element of
traditional eastern Asian architecture, simplify it by geometry logic into two
layers, and deliberately insert it into the pre-existing structure. In the
section view, the lower layer is used as a wooden terrace extended from the
outline of the building directly to the forest; and the upper layer is used as
the ceiling, which defines four areas with height differences.
Between the two layers,
the function line in orders: the private area with 2.7 meters high in the
north; multiple people dining area set in the central axis according to the
large scale beneath the original structure frame; a silent window area for
several people with 2.7 meters high in the south; the ceiling layer cross
through the steel frame, encounter the deck with a human scale which is the
under-eave dining area. In the initial plan, the terrace would continue to the
woods as an open-air platform, and more trees planted on the land for an
immersive experience.
Transparence and
lighting
The different dining
types vary by vertical height, centers of gravity, and spatial tensions, forms
various sensory experiences, unlike separated by a decorated wall for a
closed space, but an invisible boundary. Instead, the open hall is combined
within a more transparent and continuity view, present a more simplified
atmosphere. Materials also keep consistency with the black steel frame; design
minus unnecessary furnishment, filter the colors, and maintain the transparency
and trace of lighting. The metal panel ceiling reflect greenery and vigor
introduced to interiors; darkened floor stones were grounded in the land.
Based on the primitive
co-existence between architecture, nature, and people, the design, to a minor
extent, creates a dialogue adopted of planes between forest and building and
communicate with inside and outside, at last generating an authentic space
experience and flavor scenes for the only objects: people, nature, and
delicacy.
Project credits
Clients: Aranya
Operation brand: Zhenziwei
Architects: PLAT ASIA
Design team: PLAT ASIA atelier d – DH Jung, Guowei Liu, Jingyun Lian
Interiors LDI: YiBoChuan (Shandong) Deepening Design
Landscape LDI: PLAT ASIA simo org – Xiaozhan Zhang, Xiaochun Wang
Lighting design: XinGeEr Lighting Design
Decoration design: Yanan Tao