Ningbo Wusanfang

Ningbo Wusanfang

The “Wusanfang” are scattered across Yinzhou Park. They embody artistic concepts without being extravagant, born in a vast field yet seamlessly integrated with the city. Designed by Wang Shu, head of the Architecture Department at China Academy of Art and a renowned designer, they form a leisurely and casual state: one is a gallery, one is a café, one serves as park management offices, and two are tea house buildings. The five structures employ different technical methods, local materials, and construction techniques, creating distinct landscape architectural features within the park. These “Wusanfang” are not traditional garden buildings, yet they prompt citizens to reflect on traditional elements and postmodern artistic concepts expressed through modern building materials.

“The Wusanfang consists of five small public buildings, totaling just 2,000 square meters. This was indeed a small experiment that provided a lot of practical experience in building types and construction methods for the second phase of the China Academy of Art’s Xiangshan Campus project. It also reflects the working approach of our Amateur Architecture Studio,” said architect Wang Shu.

According to Wang, a few years ago, the Wusanfang were divided into tea houses, galleries, cafés, and management offices, each using five different building types and construction methods.

The gallery faces the lake with hills at its back, featuring a undulating roof and an eaves space that exhibits typical climate-responsive characteristics of Jiangnan architecture. Gravel dry-laid strips are placed on both the front and back of the building, which can serve as display areas for outdoor potted plants. The café has both a curved roof and floor, with slightly tilted columns, and tables and chairs specially designed to adapt to the uneven ground. The tea house adopts a courtyard layout, with a 3-meter-high bluestone platform surrounded by a 6-meter-high yard, planted with two large trees whose shadows shift with the wind. Another tea house has a roof made of steel-framed glass, with a small lotus pond to the south accessed by a small bridge. The management office is based on a prototype of a flat-roofed cubic building, allowing those inside to look straight through the structure to the lake.

The wall bricks used in the “Wusanfang” vary — some are intact, others broken; some thick, others thin; some carved, others plain; some straight, others curved. All are recycled bricks from old houses, and the most traditional rammed earth technique was employed.

Wang stated: “When designing the ‘Wusanfang,’ there were three considerations initially. First, how to create modern architecture that embodies a Chinese character. Second, how to go beyond simply constructing buildings and achieve special harmony with the site and environment. Additionally, we experimented with various construction methods and building types, such as rammed earth techniques, steel-framed glass, and precast concrete — some traditional Chinese construction methods. It was like conducting scientific experiments, and these small trials were later reflected in the second phase of the Xiangshan Campus project.”

“Chinese construction workers still retain a certain degree of traditional craftsmanship, but nowadays they are unfamiliar with traditional methods, and many crafts are no longer used, thus deteriorating and gradually being forgotten. Through some small experiments, we carried out large-scale promotion. The Xiangshan Campus spans over 150,000 square meters, all of which utilized traditional craftsmanship and construction methods. The purpose is to promote them — only then does it have value. Traditional Chinese craftsmanship is relatively low-cost, but traditional methods can only be preserved if they are actually used,” said Wang Shu.