Huarun Haidian Playbook

City renewal awakens new life: the landscape renovation of the China Resources Haidian Xingfuli sales pavilion in Beijing, by DDON, began with a first site visit in May 2020. The project faces Xuefu Shu North Street, where the municipal sidewalk was pitted from years of neglect, street trees had grown crooked, and undergrowth was chaotic. The building's red-brick facade carried the imprint of a decade-old faux-European style, and the European-style fountain directly facing the entry was derelict and unusable. Through the building's floor-to-ceiling windows lay a messy rear yard, unchangeable service rooms, European planters and disheveled planting, all speaking of an earlier era. The team wanted to preserve as many mature trees as possible while reordering the site; at only 2,000 square meters, the challenge was to integrate architecture, landscape and interior within a sealed corner of the city and wake up happiness again. The existing gate and wall are redefined: there is no longer a gate, but a place that invites passersby to explore, and three groups of feature walls and grilles loosely re-mark the entry. A pomegranate tree is half-hidden at a corner; around the feature walls stand preserved white ash and poplars, kept entirely because they are the best witnesses of time. To strengthen the order of the canopy, all chaotic middle-story planting is removed, leaving only sun and tree shadows; linear tree pits divide planting space and subtly resolve the level change, and alternating rhythms of wall and green give the small plot a renewed calm.