2019 Second Youth Association torch collection point

The Xihoudu site is located at Fenglingdu, Ruicheng County, Shanxi, at the junction of Shanxi, Shaanxi and Henan. It faces the Zhongtiao Mountains to the north, the Hua Mountains to the south, and the Yellow River to the west. It is one of the most important prehistoric archaeological sites in the world and a national key cultural relic protection unit. Sixty years ago, the earliest evidence of human use of fire was found here, dating back about 1.8 million years. In 2019, Shanxi hosted the Second National Youth Games and required a renovation of the existing flame square on Rengeda Ridge to hold the flame-lighting ceremony. The design challenge was that the existing fire-kindling platform, ignition platform and square could not be demolished. The solution was to use landscape architecture to integrate the flame square and its surroundings into one another, creating a magical, spiritual and philosophical place that reinterprets the unity of heaven and earth through contemporary design. The extremely short construction period and severe cold forced the creative use of a local-earth-simulating GRC material; the material was benchmarked against local loess and used Baogushi's earth-simulating architectural concrete, coordinating the natural relationship between the heritage itself and its setting. The newly planned Flame Park uses three connected narratives, the discovery of fire, the ritual of fire and the taming of fire, to give Rengeda Ridge a new human and natural experience. The project is a landscape installation at one of the world's earliest fire-using sites, using contemporary earthen concrete to stage the lighting of the Youth Games flame in a setting that is simultaneously prehistoric, sacred and civic.