Sanya Poly Shallow Sea Time

Poly Shallow Sea Time (Qianshi Shiguangli) sits in Yazhou Bay, Sanya, on China's southernmost coast, facing the South China Sea and backed by the 2,000-year-old Yazhou Ancient City. The brand ambition is "Yazhou chronicle, romantic Tianya" - to build southern China's most romantic cultural-tourism town around the theme of love. The design by GVL Yijing Shenzhen starts from the bay's coastal position and its unrivalled sunset views, translating romantic affect into flowing, low-key spatial sequences. At entry, a quiet arc of feature wall rises like a sail against the sea wind and like a miniature of the ancient city's tiled roofs; a reflecting pool doubles the wall's light play. Rolling lawns and dark paths woven through miscanthus, edged by white curving flowerbeds that echo wave lines, carry visitors from encounter to companionship. The architectural and spiritual centre is the Sunset-Chasing Chapel: a white circular hall whose circular plan symbolises the wholeness of love. Its second floor is the prime sunset platform; a mirrored pool below reflects sky and sea, and the pointed-roof chapel becomes the marker where love is fixed. In early design the team considered static framing windows, then a clock-like device; finally they made the chapel itself rotate on its second floor, so that as a visitor approaches, a transparent walkway extends over the water and the chapel turns to rest on the exact direction of that evening's sunset. Metal scales set into the pool bottom record the rotation angle, memorialising each person's private moment with the setting sun. Surrounding B&Bs show Yazhou's layered, earthy texture: front courtyards offer relaxed resort life, while rear courtyards are quieter reception spaces using local materials and plants to recall dried wood, white sand, fishing fires and sails. Tropical planting adds warmth. The 9,961-square-metre project, completed in June 2020 for Poly Hainan Tourism, treats sky, waves and sunset as gifts of Yazhou: the sun may turn, time may flow, but a single moment here can be recorded and made eternal.