Extension of Homes: Activity Pavilions at Yunjin Road

Scenic Architecture designed a series of buildings for public services in the Runway Park, which was renovated from 100-year old Longhua airport located at the west bank of Huangpu River, Shanghai. This project is a concentrated part of the whole series with three buildings including a community pavilion, a coffee shop, and a restaurant. The overall layout was based on the linear site of the park. We set up a series of concrete walls with different length and spacing in the short direction. They divide ground spaces and also support atruss-made folded plate roof system. As a metaphor of airplane takeoff, these fluctuated pitched roofsextending along the runwayestablishes a historical connection with the past. A group of internal spaces perpendicular to the runway are defined by walls and roofs while being extensively connected with each other, just like a gathered group of homes. This spatial ambiguity between open and enclose offers more freedom and possibilities for future usage. All three buildings were generated from this structural system. Variety of wall spacing, roof width and roof height provide spaces in different scales. Natural lights from the high windows between the interlaced folded plates enrich different atmospheres with light and shadow. By organizing this system in a flexible way we are also able to give individual character to each building. The semi-open space of the coffee shop near the metro exit, the courtyard between different zones of the community pavilion, and the sunken space plus the loft of the restaurant all reflect the adaptive spatial potential of the system.