W-Mills

W-Mills by Wutopia Lab was commissioned by Kerry Properties to create an Underground Park called Xiangshi Li on the B2 level of the south mall of Jing An Kerry Centre, a multi-functional dining and social space with Social Eating at its core. Before approaching Wutopia Lab, the site had already been designed by the Spanish firm LRV, and construction had begun with most materials ordered. LRV's was a conventionally good design, but the space remained caught in the involution of known spatial typologies; unable to visit Shanghai due to COVID-19, LRV could not feel the intensity of Shanghai mall competition, which far exceeds the European context. In the domestic market, scenario-based retail such as Wenheyou and Shanghai North Bund Raffles has emerged to avoid commercial involution, but research showed that if Xiangshi Li became a tourist-attraction-style set piece, the flood of sightseers would conflict with and damage the social atmosphere that Social Eating requires. Another possibility emerged: since LRV's material orders were already placed, the designer need not make large changes; by studying the existing design, it could become the background of a new intervention, with the center read as a social piazza or a social garden. Embedding the garden wastes no materials, delays no construction, and turns the refined original design into the streetscape of the Underground Park. Xiangshi Li is designed not merely as a dining place; Wutopia Lab created a unique Social Eating Space. Taking the park as the organizing concept, it cleverly accommodates greenhouse, pavilion, open-air bar, and shared dining areas, weaving multiple paths to surrounding restaurants into a permeable, interconnected whole. There are continuous upholstered booths and warm wooden benches; a central small stage surrounded by flowers and wine; a large dining table and cake house capped by a dazzling petal-shaped light. Inside the Park, enjoying food, wine, flowers, and music, conversation becomes relaxed and easy. The first scene is an arcade: Wutopia Lab created a new world connecting two worlds. Using LRV's background to form the Underground Park gives this zone a temperament distinct from every other area of Jing An Kerry Centre, so a transition is needed. Stepping into the roughly 20-meter passage, the designer drew on the European arcade that leads to a market; the traditional arcade is abstracted into a passage, a filter, or a transformation gate, allowing people accustomed to the standard public-zone design of Kerry Centre to pass through a psychological preview before discovering the spectacular Underground Park within, reaching a climactic moment. This passage is not commercial but a public corridor; it has no function, yet possesses a presence.