Since opening their debut in a former Freemason’s Hall in Shoreditch almost twenty years ago, Andaz have proven a canny ability to get ahead of the curve and open high-end hotels in up-and-coming neighbourhoods. Andaz Shanghai ITC follows suit, as the first lux stay in Xujiahui (the centre of the Former French Concession, aka Xuhui), set inside the new International Trade Centre complex. As is the Andaz way, the interiors are inspired by the locality, and this branch has gone for a nod to nostalgia. It’s an urban bolt hole, but the open-air movie nights, outdoor yoga and DJs in the cocktail bar make Andaz Shanghai ITC more than just a spot to rest your head.

Wallpaper* checks in at Andaz Shanghai ITC

What’s on your doorstep?

Slightly removed from the tourist trail, Xuhui is an enclave of heritage buildings, leafy parks and wide boulevard streets. Its main thoroughfares are fast-paced, but the side streets are homey, with the occasional impressive art deco apartment block or modernist civil building tucked away. The district’s supporting cast, which the Andaz design team took their inspiration from, is the distinctly Shanghaiese shikumen, or Lane Houses; the pre-war era micro-communities of dwellings that curl around communal courtyards with arched gateway entrances. Shikumen can date as far back as the mid-19th century, melding Chinese and European styles, and you can spot them around Xuhui, particularly those repurposed as cafés and boutiques. The area also comes with cultural cachet, as the home to Xujiahui Library, St. Ignatius Cathedral, and the Shanghai Film Museum, all within a 10-minute stroll of the hotel.

Who is behind the design?

This newly opened Andaz is part of a vast architectural project designed by the Hong Kongese P&T Group, the Xujiahui International Trade Centre. The ITC is a self-proclaimed ‘vertical neighbourhood’ of streamlined pathways, encompassing the Andaz, condo and office blocks, soon-to-open malls and the other ITC figurehead, Tower 2, which at 70 storeys and a soaring 370m in height, makes it the tallest tower in Puxi, the west side of the river.

The Andaz Shanghai ITC interiors are by HBA, who have artfully mirrored features of the heritage buildings of Xuhui to elicit an elegant time warp, while infusing a playful tone through the pops in colour and flow of lighting and space. Alleyway-like corridors lead into naturally light-drenched, high-ceilinged drinking and dining spaces. HBA’s Matthew Liu explains: ‘The communal spaces (the gym and swimming pool) were inspired by the historic rowing clubs along the Huangpu River. We are particularly proud of the dining rooms on the 14th floor. Architecturally, they reference traditional Shanghai lane houses; their proportions and spatial scale closely reflect those residential typologies.’ Think classy but cosy.

The 14th floor lobby is a design whimsy, with 1930s flashback elevators and a grand clock that has its own daily ritual at 5.30 pm, marking the moment when day becomes night. Grey brick provides a neutral backdrop to the colourful light fixtures and inviting textiles used throughout this floor, which also houses three lively dining spaces, the East Wing, the Rooftop Bar and the West Wing. ‘Brick was reinterpreted in multiple forms and materials across different areas of the hotel to define character, texture, and spatial identity,’ Matthew Liu told us. The vivid turquoise chandeliers of the East Wing and cluster of bright light globes and mirror balls in the Rooftop Bar are stand-out features, but honourable mentions go to the wellness floor’s triathlon mosaic by SONITE, art installations in the dining spaces by Debut Studio and Lu Jian Xin’s large wall piece ‘City Coordinates’, all accentuating movement and dynamism of the neighbourhood below.

The room to book

The 267 rooms come in five different types, each styled as the abode of a creative professional; the King rooms are the home of a fashion designer, the Twin rooms are the creative artist’s, the Andaz suites are the photographer’s house, the Premier suite is the florists and the unfathomably swish Executive suite is the jewellery designer’s pad, with all five decorated with art and artefacts to fit the profession. We loved the Andaz suite, a three-room affair on the corner of two corridors with sweeping views of Xujiahui below. Cameras deck the walls, as do used film reels and photography books, all adding fun detail and commitment to the theme. The sizeable sofa and bathtub in the Andaz suite are both ideal for reviving your feet after a busy day marching through the city, resetting before heading to the bar.

Voss water is plentiful throughout the room. Cans of Heineken beer and Coca-Cola sit cooled in the fridge, as do bottles of soda water. Spirits come in the form of Absolute Vodka, The Singleton Single Malt Scotch Whisky (Aged 12 Years) and most interestingly, a lightly spiced local Shanghai craft gin by Peddlers Gin Co, infused with lotus, cardamom, Sichuan pepper, Chinese cassia, and liquorice, to name just half the ingredients. TWG Tea bags and Nespresso coffee pods are also readily available.

Staying for drinks and dinner?

Executive Chef of Andaz Shanghai ITC, Jesse Chen, is Shanghainese born and bred, and has returned home after working in Europe for a long stint. She tells us, ‘Sweet things bring people joy; I am a typical Shanghainese that way. I saw my mother and grandma cooking a lot of rich sauces like soy sauce and sweet and sour sauce.’ So on the East Wing’s menu, she showcases these Shanghai flavours with plates of braised pork belly, slow-cooked lotus root, marinated river prawns, and of course dim sum and bao.

In the West Wing, there’s a multicultural approach, typical of Shanghai, with a deli-like counter offering Spanish tapas and Italian bites. After grazing, there are tea-based cocktails in the Rooftop Bar, concocted by bar manager Van Li. The Pomelo Oolong with pineapple, Japanese yuzu and 10-year-old Lafroig is a smoky dream. His domain is afternoon tea by day and DJs and board games by night.

The verdict

Despite being China’s capital of nostalgia, finding glimpses of old school Shanghai can be elusive beyond The Bund, given the forward-facing and futuristic nature of the city’s design. So Andaz Shanghai ITC is something of a shrine to the city of yesteryear, putting working-class culture (communal living, kids' games, everyday flavours) on a pedestal through its design. It’s a heart-warming stay without being too kitsch, elegantly done but with a lot of character. Everything is seamless, as you’d expect from a chain so committed to understated luxury, but the ease is a particularly welcome respite from the fast pace of the city outside.

Andaz Shanghai ITC is located at Hongqiao Rd. 283, Shanghai, China 200030

In February 2025, British skate brand Palace brought a slice of its culture to Seoul, creating an abstracted version of the concrete undercroft of London’s Southbank Centre inside its first Asian store. Long a haven for skaters, including Palace co-founders Lev Tanju and Gareth Skewis, the brutalist landmark was where the brand was first conceived in 2009. ‘Palace wouldn’t exist without Southbank,’ Tanju told us at the time.

A new store in Shanghai, China, the brand’s latest expansion into the continent, takes a slightly different approach, interpreting the traditional architecture of the region – namely, the Shanghai garden – through Palace’s irreverent, contemporary lens. The store is part of the Zhangyuan complex in the city’s Jing'an District, a series of shikumen buildings from the late 19th century – originally known as ‘Zhang’s Weichun Garden’ after its owner Zhang Shuhe – whereby the original façades and narrow alleyways have been retained (several luxury stores occupy the complex, including Louis Vuitton, Dior and Celine).

Inside Palace’s new Shanghai store

In keeping with the location, the exterior retains the building’s original façade, though distinctive signage sees the brand’s signature tri-ferg logo – designed by Fergus Purcell and inspired by the ‘impossible’ Penrose Triangle by Swedish artist Oscar Reutersvärd – angled downwards from the roof, as if hovering over the street. Meanwhile, a playful sculpture of a bulldog, like that inside the Seoul store, appears in a doorway, and a covered pond – reminiscent of those in traditional Shanghai gardens – greets visitors at the entranceway (the Palace cherub and penjing tree feature as part of this ‘terrace’).

‘I really love the outside water features, and of course, I’m a big fan of the bulldog,’ says Skewis, who has been travelling to China for the last 20 years. ‘Now felt like the right time [to open the store] from a cultural point of view, looking at the skate scene and where modern youth culture is at in China.’ As for why Palace chose Shanghai, it was the first place Palace visited in the country. ‘We have a long history with the skate scene here. It’s been amazing to see how that scene has evolved over the last few years.’

Inside, a series of LED columns line the entrance to the store’s interior, which is composed largely of stone tiles and limestone – materials traditional to the region – while bolder accents of gold and red reflect traditional Chinese rituals. The idea of a garden runs throughout the space: at the centre is a structure inspired by the pavilion, which began as military watchtowers but were soon repurposed in private gardens of places of leisure, whereby you could immerse yourself in nature. The Zhangyuan location, says Skewis, was chosen for this interplay of tradition and modernity. ‘Zhangyuan is so central and has a historical point of view too, but it also feels somehow very modern Shanghai to me,’ says Skewis.

To celebrate the opening, a series of no-doubt sellout garments and objects will be available exclusively in the Shanghai store. These include a biker jacket, hoodies, T-shirts and more, featuring a new ‘Shang-Hi’ motif and a new rabbit mascot – inspired by the Chinese zodiac – while other graphics take inspiration from Shanghai landmarks, including the Oriental Pearl Tower, which lends to the city’s unique skyline.

Palace Shanghai, Unit W1-1A, Zhangyuan, 280 Maoming North Road, Jing’an District, Shanghai, Chin

palaceskateboards.com

Design Shanghai is Asia’s premier showcase of contemporary design, bringing together over 500 brands from 20 countries. ‘For 13 years, Design Shanghai has championed modern design across China and Asia,’ says show director Zhuo Tan. ‘It’s inspiring to see designers shaping this momentum as Asian design steps confidently onto the global stage.’

The 13th edition returned to the Shanghai Exhibition Centre on 19 March 2026, running until 22 March, and Wallpaper’s head of interiors Olly Mason is there, taking in the world-renowned brands, visionary designers and emerging talent. This year, the fair is organised into five sections: ‘Talents’, ‘Made in JDZ’, ‘Beyond Craft’, ‘Collectible Design & Art’ and ‘Materials First’.

Read on for our guide to the fair, including standout designers and noteworthy creations.

Design Shanghai 2026: championing Asian talent

Design Shanghai shines a spotlight on Chinese and Asian design, from established icons to emerging voices. Notable names shaping the continent’s design identity include 12h, founded by Zeng Qiang, which, for this year's event, introduces the 'Record Cabinet', crafted from solid wood with midcentury influences for a new generation of vinyl enthusiasts; and Shang Xia, whose exhibition has been imagined by Zhou Guangming to embody a contemporary oriental lifestyle, integrating traditional craft into modern hospitality design.

Pusu, led by Chen Yanfei, channels Ming-style furniture and calligraphy into functional art pieces finished with lacquer, while U+, under Shen Baohong, fuses traditional forms with a global design language, exploring the dialogue between Eastern and Western philosophies. Finally, Past To Now reinterprets historical designs, showing how heritage can evolve for contemporary audiences. Collectively, these creators reflected a confident design language rooted in native craftsmanship, yet more than capable of standing on the global stage.

‘Beyond Craft’: reimagining tradition

The ‘Beyond Craft’ section celebrates Asia’s powerful craft heritage while simultaneously demonstrating its relevance today. Japanese brands feature strongly in this section: Yamato applies washi paper and gold leaf to modern interiors, Domyo transforms centuries-old knotted cord techniques into contemporary creations, and Kubo Paper Studio reinterprets 1,300-year-old paper-making. Elsewhere, Emission merges optical materials and artistry in immersive lighting and jewellery, Kasane repurposes ancient roofing materials into sustainable wall panels, and Hario Lampwork Factory extends traditional glasswork into jewellery and design objects.

Chinese brands also reinterpret heritage for modern contexts. Notably, Bing Yu Tang, collaborating with designer He Kaining, reimagines 5,000 years of incense history, using spatial design, objects and sensory experiences to connect ancient rituals with modern living.

‘Talents’: introducing the next generation

Curated by product and furniture designer Frank Chou, ‘Talents’ highlights designers under 35. This year’s theme, ‘About Time’, explores time in terms of cultural, personal and societal shifts.

Highlights include Liang Living Studio, which explores marbled porcelain vessels using traditional Japanese 'neriage' techniques across stone, metal and wood; Jun Wang Studio, which, in collaboration with designer Ziyuan Jiang, presents experimental lighting investigating structure and material tension; and Friedrich Gerlach’s 'Biocement Chair', crafted from recycled construction waste. Also worth a mention is the work of Yin Dahua, which merges Chinese joinery traditions with minimalist sculptural furniture and lighting.

‘Made in JDZ’: modern ceramics

Curated by designer Ryan Ran, ‘Made in JDZ’ celebrates the city of Jingdezhen’s historic ceramics while reinterpreting them for today. The 2026 theme, ‘On the Stage’, examines intersections between craft, fashion, interiors and everyday objects, highlighting how heritage techniques find new life in modern iterations.

Featured works include Handiceramics’ ‘Emotion Edge’, a geometric mug with a triangular base symbolising the coexistence of emotions; Nearby’s ‘Spherical Stem Cup’, a delicate porcelain vessel accented with ceramic beads; and Sheenyard’s’ Modest Light’, which demonstrates how traditional techniques can create warmth in modern spaces.

‘Collectible Design & Art’: bridging art and design

This section brings together makers, galleries and curators to present limited-edition works that straddle art and design. Contributors include Hugo Design, Es Art Society, Mingyu Xu Studio, Natura Accessories, Zeto Art and Jaipur Rugs.

‘Re-Art Room’, curated by Yiqian Zhao, integrates 20th-century furniture with contemporary artworks, inviting visitors to engage with tactile, human-centred qualities of design. Zhao’s ‘Dreamer’, a 4m-high mixed-media sculpture, merges historical references with commentary on consumer culture; Hu Yuehua’s ‘Weaving Nature’ reinterprets ecological forms through cotton, linen and indigo-dyed textiles; and Shuare Shizhu’s ‘Quest for Urban Signals’ explores the dialogue between the Daliang Mountains and Shanghai’s urban fabric.

‘New Materials & Applications’: showcasing material innovation

The ‘New Materials & Applications’ space brings together designers and makers who explore surfaces, composites and artisan techniques, from sustainable solutions to experimental finishes. Exhibitors such as Burgeree and Ecowel demonstrate cutting-edge materials, while Emission and Hario Lampwork Factory highlight optical and handcrafted glass innovations.

What, at its essence, is a fashion boutique? It’s a space for brands to present their wares, yes – but in today’s luxury landscape, that definition feels insufficient. The most influential brands now prioritise universe-building as much as they do merchandising. Customers aren’t purchasing a garment so much as an aesthetic worldview – and the boutique becomes a tangible expression of that vision.

In 2025, this idea crystallised into a full-scale revival of fashion retail. A series of brands unveiled high-concept stores that treated fashion, art and design as a whole. JW Anderson has restyled its stores as design-driven marketplaces offering not just clothing but ceramics and other crafted objects. Extreme Cashmere introduced a boutique where the clothing nearly disappears into a domestic setting. A series of smaller stores have also emerged: like Jake’s, the Saturday-only store which sees Jake Burt, one half of London-based label Stefan Cooke, sell an ever-changing roster of weekly one-offs designed by him and his friends (pastry chef and model Louis Thompson provides the cakes).

Here, we are focusing on the store design itself: from Stone Island’s experiments with cutting-edge tech to stores-turned-galleries, these were the retail concepts that defined 2025 in fashion.

Acne Studios, Tokyo

Acne Studios’ new three-level Aoyama flagship blends minimalist architecture with playful textures. Designed by co-founder Jonny Johansson and Halleroed, the glass-lined, garage-like space is clad in pink granite and filled with vibrant furnishings by the likes of Max Lamb and Benoit Lalloz. The store remains faithful to Acne Studios’ Scandi roots, but nods to Japan through details like candy-bright ceramics by Takuro Kuwata.

READ: Step inside Acne Studios’ pink-hued Tokyo flagship: ‘fashion is supposed to be fun’

Miu Miu, London 

Miu Miu’s revamped New Bond Street store feels clean and contemporary, defined by an industrial metal grid floor, crisp lighting and bold yellow-green display cases. Upstairs, warmer touches – parquet, plush rugs and a sculptural wooden ceiling – add softness. Crucially, this space is conceived as more than a boutique; it functions as a cultural and social hub.

READ: Inside Miu Miu’s ‘proudly modern and minimal’ new London store

Longchamp, New York

The showstopper at Longchamp’s revamped New York flagship is the vivid green steel-ribbon staircase. Thomas Heatherwick returned to reimagine his 2004 design, shifting focus from theatricality to a warm ‘Parisian apartment’ feel. An opened-up upper floor, green carpeting, vintage furniture and eclectic art create a refined but lived-in atmosphere.

READ: Thomas Heatherwick revamps his New York flagship for Longchamp – 20 years after he first designed it

Extreme Cashmere, Amsterdam

At Extreme Cashmere’s Amsterdam store, opened in April, the display of garments is almost secondary to creating a home-like spirit. Plush carpets, a stainless-steel kitchen block, a ‘cashmere spa’ washing machine and curated objects encourage intimate, relaxed interaction with the brand’s sizeless, genderless pieces, which are displayed market-style.

READ: Extreme Cashmere reimagines retail with its new Amsterdam store: ‘You want to take your shoes off and stay’

Dries Van Noten, London

In March, Dries Van Noten ushered in a new era under creative director Julian Klausner, following the founder’s 2024 departure. A new London store on Hanover Square followed, housed in a former bank. The two-floor space showcases fashion and beauty amid artworks by Hockney, Man Ray and Tracey Emin, plus eclectic furniture, design pieces and a vinyl corner.

READ: Dries Van Noten’s new London store is an eclectic, art-filled haven

JW Anderson, London

Jonathan Anderson is slowly but surely steering JW Anderson towards a lifestyle focus, with stores now mixing in art, ceramics and homewares – from Akiko Hirai pieces to Charles Rennie Mackintosh stools. Gallery-style displays spotlight works by Mary Stephenson, Gwen John, Christina Kimeze, Robert Kulicke and more, underscoring a growing curatorial slant. In December, a Pimlico Road store – designed by Sanchez Benton – continued to hone this vision, seeing fashion, art and interiors converge.

READ: JW Anderson’s new London store is an inviting emporium of fashion, art and homeware

Saint Laurent, Paris

Saint Laurent’s recently opened Avenue Montaigne boutique offers a museum-like experience. Across three levels, muted rooms showcase not just garments, but furniture by Süe & Mare, Paul Poiret, Jean-Michel Frank, Charlotte Perriand and Josef Hoffmann, as well as works from the Pinault Collection, including art by Mark Bradford.

Stone Island, New York

Stone Island boldly stepped into the future with its SoHo flagship, embodying CEO Robert Triefus’ refreshed vision. Designed by AMO, the two-storey space showcases the brand’s ‘lab’ ethos of material innovation, featuring charred cork, stainless steel and immersive digital screens. A subterranean lounge with a DJ booth and bar completes the experience.

READ: With exclusive merch and a secret lounge, Stone Island’s New York flagship is all about discovery

Loewe, Paris

Loewe’s first ‘Casa Loewe’ on Avenue Montaigne evokes an art collector’s home. Colourful ceramic tiles meet marble, brass and concrete, illuminated by abundant natural light. The space is furnished with pieces by Gerrit Rietveld, George Nakashima and Isamu Noguchi, which sit alongside Loewe leatherwork, rugs inspired by John Allen and an eclectic art collection spanning Franz Erhard Walther to Domingos Tótora.

Dior, Shanghai

Christian de Portzamparc’s House of Dior boutique in Beijing is a freestanding, five-storey flagship wrapped in sculptural white resin ‘petals’ and golden glass panels. Not only does this lantern-like behemoth blend couture and architecture, it also incorporates lifestyle – home to a restaurant from Anne-Sophie Pic, OMA-designed displays, VIP salons and art-filled interiors alongside floors of fashion.

READ: Inside Christian de Portzamparc’s showstopping House of Dior Beijing: ‘sculptural, structural, alive’

The newest architecture biennale has hit the scene. Since the founding of the Venice Architecture Biennale in 1980, hundreds of similar events have sprung up around the globe, but what makes each one stand out? Rockbund Architecture Museum assembles (RAMa) was founded two years ago in a historic district of Shanghai, once subject to colonial British rule. First curated by David Chipperfield in 2023 on the architect's completion of an 18-year restoration of the neighbourhood, RAMa is back for a second cycle, mixing six new installations with a new answer to the big question: what are biennales designed to address?

Explore the 2025 RAMa, the architecture biennial at Rockbund Art Museum

Unlike many bigger and arguably more famous biennales, all of RAMa 2025 is taking place outdoors, in public and for free. This generosity isn’t simply altruism but part of a remarkably precise curatorial strategy conceived by Rachaporn Choochuey, this year’s RAMa artistic director and cofounder of studio all(zone). For the Bangkok-based architect, her festival has a very clear goal: coax the real-estate company responsible for the area to allow a richer suite of amenities in the public spaces they control.

'I am trying to persuade the owner,' she tells me bluntly, but explains that, for her, the best way to win round sceptics is to be diplomatic. Instead of lobbying the landowners up-front to allow benches, drinking fountains, street vendors and the like, Choochuey is using the biennale to provide pop-up proof that such things are boons to the Shanghai streetscape. 'Critique can never be direct,' she smiles, 'with a very simple gesture you can do a lot of things.'

The six installations Choochuey has curated all provide a public amenity currently missing from the vicinity – food stalls by Alkhemist Architects, for example, and a long blue bench by Tangent Essays. Choochuey herself has created a multicoloured polyethylene canopy, a riff on larger pavilions she’s made previously in Australia and Thailand (such as her design for the 2022 MPavilion in Melbourne).

Most successful is a gregarious yellow drinking fountain by WWWorks, serving thirsty passers-by by filtering rainwater from an adjacent roof. It’s charismatic and playful with water spouts at three heights to maximise accessibility, and proportions that cleverly relate to some nearby pipework. It’s exactly the kind of exuberant and useful public realm upgrade from which the whole world would benefit.

Less persuasive are some clumps of moss created by Beijing-based Studio Vapore in an attempt to provoke debate about the value of nature in urban space. They make a valid point in principle, of course, but the bumpy green hillocks, made from earth and florist foam sitting on plastic membranes, prove no match for Shanghai’s 35-degree heat. Even with regular watering, the clumps fail to root and are already starting to turn brown just a few days into the biennale.

At first glance, nothing in the RAMa programme might seem especially radical (of course, benches and drinking fountains are nice!); however, such a line of critique would miss the point. The exciting thing about RAMa 2025 is not the topics it raises or the objects it has commissioned, but the laser focus of its underlying ambition.

With the impact of so many architectural biennales undermined by ponderous esoteric themes, too diffuse to effect change in practice, RAMa 2025 stands out for its humility and realistic mission. Choochuey is not arrogant or naive enough to think her biennale can change the world, even a little. But maybe it can change one neighbourhood of one city a lot.

In Shanghai’s cocktail revolution – and ensuing evolution – Nanchang Road has emerged as something as a hub, where young mixologists come to debut herbal infusions and established ones come to earn accolades. In a refurbished townhouse at the leafy far end, Penicillin is a bit of both. A ‘closed-loop sustainable bar’ by Agung and Laura Prabowo, who opened their award-winning sister bar in Hong Kong in 2020, it operates with mad-scientist energy, turning out experimental distillations with foraged and repurposed ingredients.

Penicillin Shanghai – well worth a shot

The magic happens in the upstairs lab, accessible to patrons who want in on the making process. Designed in clinical steel and concrete by Louis Chon of Hong Kong’s LC Studio, it centres on two chef’s tables flanked by vats, funnels, rotary evaporators and distillers. Guests can sit at the glass terrarium table with, say, a One Pot Pan, a ‘flower tequila’ cocktail with leftover hops, fermented rice water, charred-chive cordial and strawberry hydrosol, as the ingredients steep and ferment around them.

‘There’s been a surge here of artisanal cocktails infused with Chinese ingredients, appealing to adventurous palates,’ says co-founder Laura Prabowo. ‘And that’s led to a trend towards themed venues that offer curated experiences rather than just drinks.’

Groups of up to six people can proceed to the Green Room and sink into sofas the colour of grape leaves. Yet Chon has done his most memorable work on the main floor. In a rotunda at the entrance, he’s suspended a fallen Chinese hackberry tree trunk rescued from a village outside Shanghai. The desiccated roots, floating inches off the floor, are a reminder of Penicillin’s foundational principles: renewable resources, organic elegance and zero-waste practices.

Fully visible from the pavement, the tree has become a neighbourhood curiosity. ‘Every guest who walks past touches it,’ says Prabowo. And thanks to its popularity on Xiaohungshu, the social networking app also known as RedNote, Penicillin has swiftly become the pinnacle of every Nanchang Road cocktail crawl. ‘With younger patrons, the emphasis is on aesthetics, ambience and visual appeal.’

Circling the tree is a backdrop of reflecting panels and a ring of banquettes where guests can perch for photos and wait for friends. The main cocktail lounge is more intimate, outfitted in gunmetal greys and manned by Jamie McCleave, a founding member of the Hong Kong branch, with local veteran Chris Wu. The Penicillin ethos means branded liquor is eschewed in favour of house-infused spirits, so a feature wall behind the bar is stacked with brown recycled eco-spirit bottles.

Prabowo knows this will attract just the right kind of cocktail junkie, and raise the bar of the neighbourhood offering. ‘Contributing to the identity of Nanchang Road, being part of this transformation, excites us.’

Penicillin Shanghai is located at 62 Nanchang Rd, Putung, Shanghai, China 200025.

Louis Vuitton has unveiled an ambitious new cultural and retail destination in Shanghai’s Wujiang Road, part of the heaving Nanjing West Road business district. ‘The Louis’ inhabits a colossal, cruise ship-like structure, nearly 100ft tall, that pays tribute to the maison’s history as a malletier (trunk maker) and Shanghai’s port history as the ‘Gateway to the East’. Its prow and hull sport a sleek metallic Monogram embellishment, while the deck and stacked upper levels evoke the elegant shape of 19th-century transoceanic travel trunks.

Louis Vuitton launches The Louis in Shanghai

Spanning the first two floors is exhibition and retail space. The retail concept offers leather goods customisable with ship motifs or the Shanghai skyline, along with limited-edition pieces. Anchoring the site is the immersive ‘Louis Vuitton Visionary Journeys’ exhibition, featuring scenography designed by OMA’s Shohei Shigematsu. The expansive display celebrates the house’s history, from its origins in Asnières, France to maritime adventures and contemporary innovations.

Signature installations include Trunkscape, also designed by Shigematsu: a striking tunnel of floating Monogram trunks previously seen at LV The Place in Bangkok and the Nakanoshima Museum of Art in Osaka, alongside a series of multisensory, themed sections that chronicle Louis Vuitton’s legacy in travel, fragrance, literature, sport, and craftsmanship.

Le Café Louis Vuitton, a high-end dining experience blending Eastern and Western influences, is situated on the third floor and opens onto an outdoor terrace with seating that nods to the seaside. Chefs Leonardo Zambrino and Zoe Zhou present a refined menu inspired by mentorship under chefs Arnaud Donckele and Maxime Frédéric, as well as their formative experiences in Paris and Saint-Tropez.

Highlights include Monogram Ravioli styled after traditional jiaozi (Chinese dumplings), the Cesar Salad Eclipse with yuja dressing, and indulgent desserts such as Peach Charlotte with jasmine tea.

Entrance to Louis Vuitton’s The Louis is free and open to the public, with reservations available via the ‘My LV’ WeChat mini program. The site is open daily from 10am to 10pm and is located at HKRI Taikoo Hui, No. 789 West Nanjing Road, Shanghai, China.

The 12th edition of Design Shanghai (4-7 June 2025), the final one held at the site of the 2010 Shanghai World Expo before the event's anticipated return to the socialist-classicism of the Shanghai Exhibition Centre in 2026, brought together a diverse range of brands and designers, reflecting how creativity continues to evolve amid economic headwinds. While China’s design and creative sectors remain resilient and show steady growth, participants are navigating a more challenging market shaped by slower economic expansion and shifting consumer priorities. Against this backdrop, the fair highlighted how tradition and innovation intersect, with exhibitors exploring new narratives in materiality, sustainability and cultural identity.

Among our list of highlights is U+, founded in 2008 to merge Chinese tradition with global sensibilities. Its 'New Antique' series revisits a trove of unpublished works from the 1970s and 1980s, reinterpreting them through refined materials and craftsmanship. The expanding 'Tea System' responds to increasing local demand with modular pieces designed to elevate the tea ritual through integrated storage and smart tools.

The wood flooring brand Ugan Concept collaborated with Neri & Hu Design and Research Office on the 'Primordial' installation. Inspired by the Waban House in southwestern China, where split wooden shingles are traditionally used as roof tiles, the project reclaims this vernacular form amid widespread demolition. Neri & Hu’s design assembles six roof structures into an abstract village, using a minimal steel framework to explore material reuse, spatial flexibility and craftsmanship within a contemporary architectural language.

Three designer-led brands, among the fair’s longest-standing exhibitors despite entering only their first decade, demonstrated the adaptability needed to compete with mass producers in a shifting economy. Ximi Li’s 'Monochrome' series for Urbancraft caters to mid-sized interior operators, combining rapid delivery with adaptable design. The collection investigates the versatility and inherent aesthetic of aluminium, offering applications across varied spatial contexts.

Joysliving, co-founded by Ren Hongfei, is known for its exacting standards in materials and production, attracting collaborations with fashion brands such as Marni and Delvaux. Its latest product, the ‘Song’ chair, draws from the rhythm of Chinese calligraphy, with sharply defined lines and a tall backrest that balances comfort and formality. Tiwuworks, led by Zhao Yun, takes a more bespoke direction with its 'Dark Ink' series. Referencing craft traditions from ancient pottery to woodwork, the series applies advanced manufacturing techniques to solid wood, producing forms that are both innovative and historically grounded.

Interest in Tibetan culture has grown alongside a rise in domestic travel. This year, three Tibetan brands came together to present a pavilion shaped by regional traditions, drawing from the form of black yak-hair tents and defined by the distinctive ‘Tibetan red’. Changphel showcased handcrafted rugs rooted in Himalayan landscapes and age-old techniques. Its nomadic essence was best captured through its 'Collector’s Editions', featuring collaborations with French sculptor Jean-Marie Fiori, Italian architect Gaetano Pesce and Chinese painter Huang Yongyu. NomRoo translated the spiritual and natural qualities of the highlands into a line of home fragrances, with scents shaped by snow-capped peaks, quiet temples and rare alpine plants. Zamba Boutique Hotels announced plans to promote Tibetan culture through luxury hospitality experiences, aiming to introduce a broader audience to the region’s unique heritage.

Seven curated sections across the fair addressed diverse themes, broadening public understanding of design’s evolving boundaries and its entanglements with culture, industry and society. One of the most anticipated was 'Neooold', a recurring show-within-a-show initiated by designer Chen Min. This year’s edition focused on Chinese craftsmanship through two complementary parts: 'Mass Wonders', a curated gallery of collectible works by nine artists, and a marketplace-style display from 18 studios and brands. Among them, metalsmith Wangchunmao stood out with a teapot that challenges conventions: its square body and drawer-like mechanism reimagine the flow of water. ‘Glass Talking’ captured China’s evolving glassmaking landscape, spanning both the artistry of hand-blown pieces and the functional refinement of industrial design.

‘Re:Materialize’, curated by Rong Design Library, advocated a ‘material-driven’ approach to sustainable innovation. It brought together 26 cross-disciplinary artists and craftspeople and 20 material producers to explore new uses of traditional and emerging resources. Duan Lisha, in collaboration with Alpi, presented a veneer collage project that plays with colour, form and pattern to create optical illusions, blurring the lines between material and technique. In 'Fading Seawater', Yanrui responded to the threat of nuclear wastewater contamination with an installation that uses indigo and kakishibu dyes to visualise ocean pollution, prompting reflection on environmental responsibility.

Another key section, 'Talents', curated by Frank Chou, explored the theme ‘Confront Conflicts’, examining how young designers navigate tensions between growth and stability, and between humans and AI. Among the 14 selected names is IIIN, a spin-off of Tells Studio, which presented furniture that prioritises spatial flow over form, aiming to evoke presence and soulfulness. Its debut collection, ‘Wahé’, references traditional Chinese roof tiles, using their adaptable, interlocking forms as metaphors for balance, compromise and conscious living.

Prada has announced the opening of its first standalone restaurant in Asia, a collaboration with acclaimed Hong Kong arthouse director Wong Kar-wai. The dining space will reside in Rong Zhai, a restored 1918 historic mansion and art venue in Shanghai inaugurated by the Prada Group in 2017 as a flexible hub for cultural activities in China.

Mi Shang Prada Rong Zhai, Shanghai

Named Mi Shang – meaning ‘to be obsessed with’ in Chinese – the restaurant will occupy the second floor, offering an all-day café service alongside a fine dining experience. The menu will centre on Italian cuisine infused with Chinese flavours, spanning breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, and evening cocktails, fostering a culinary dialogue between the two cultures.

Although yet to be fully unveiled, the design, led by Wong Kar-wai, promises to channel the distinctive aesthetics of his seminal films In the Mood for Love and Happy Together. The space will incorporate mirrors and contrasts to evoke the director’s signature illusory, sensual atmosphere. The concept also draws inspiration from the philatelic concept of tête-bêche – a pair of joined postage stamps where one has been printed upright and the other upside down, whether by design or accident.

‘The idea of reflection, adjacency, and correspondence hints at the intersection of two great cultures, connecting Milan and Shanghai in a visual dialogue that is both sophisticated and unique,’ Prada shares in a statement.

Prada’s engagement with cinema is longstanding, the brand having collaborated with directors Pedro Almodóvar, Danny Boyle, and Ava DuVernay, and also championed film conservation and funding initiatives. The group’s passion for the moving image is also seen in the design of Bar Luce at the Prada Foundation in Milan, conceived by American filmmaker Wes Anderson, as well as its in-house cinema, named after Franco-Swiss director Jean-Luc Godard.

Mi Shang Prada Rong Zhai will be located at No.186, North Shaan Xi Road, Jing’an District, Shanghai, China. It is scheduled to open to the public on 31 March 2025, with bookings taken from 29 March via WeChat mini-program; prada.com

The snake is a symbol that transcends times, places and cultures. Its universal significance is reflected in Bulgari’s serpent motif, which it has employed in various manifestations since 1948. ‘Serpenti Infinito’, which has been a travelling exhibition since 2023 (the 75th anniversary of Bulgari’s Serpenti), explores some of these manifestations.

In its latest iteration, the exhibition launched in Shanghai at the start of January 2025 to coincide with Lunar New Year, and will show until 16 February. To celebrate this chapter of the exhibition, a new work, Infinito: AI Data Sculpture by Turkish artist Refik Anadol, was unveiled.

Elsewhere, the exhibition features 28 artworks by 19 Chinese and international artists, 11 of which were created for the occasion. These are displayed alongside a selection of Bulgari’s Serpenti creations, including watches and jewellery from Bulgari Heritage and some unreleased, one-of-a-kind pieces.

The exhibition unfolds in three chapters: the first, Crafting Serpents in History, focuses on the mythology of the snake which, in Chinese culture, symbolises good luck, wealth and vitality.

These meanings have inspired the Serpenti collection ever since Bulgari launched its first snake-themed jewellery-watch in 1948. Since then, the emblem has undergone many transformations – an evolution narrated via pieces from the Heritage Collection, ranging from the Tubogas jewellery-watches of the 1960s to a five-coil Pallini bracelet-watch, created in 1955. These are shown alongside traditional artworks such as ink paintings from artist Qiu Anxiong.

The second chapter of the exhibition is called Snakes in the Arts. In art, snakes have symbolised wisdom, protection and power, expressed through ceramics, glass, stone, sculpture, painting, sound and video, as expressed in calligrapher Xu Bing's Square Word Calligraphy: Serpenti and filmmaker Luka Yuanyuan Yang's Ring of Life.

The third part of the exhibition, Contemporary Transformations, thinks about how the snake exists across cultures, times and places, and into the future. This chapter explores contemporary representations of the serpent: the ‘data sculptures’ of Refik Anadol use machine learning, while Utopic Arabia's Serpenti Odyssey comprises computer-generated artworks.

Contemporary manifestations also take shape through Bulgari high jewellery creations, unveiled exclusively for the exhibition. The Serpenti Infinito necklace, bracelet and brooch are set with onyx elements, buff-top rubies and pavé diamonds. A 140.53-carat rubellite is set at the heart of the Serpenti Rubellite Crown necklace, held by a pavé-set prong. The Serpenti Emerald Nimbus necklace in white gold, meanwhile, features a 12.73-carat emerald from Zambia.

This is not just an exhibition about jewels: it is an exploration of how Bulgari taps into timeless emblems, and how wearable symbols garner meaning.

‘Serpenti Infinito’ is at Zhangyuan, Shanghai, until 16 February 2025, bulgari.com

Alila’s first urban resort in Greater China has landed in Shanghai, taking over the skyscraper premises from the former Four Seasons with a handsome makeover by local studio Level Line Design.

Alila Shanghai opens its doors

Even for regulars to the city, there are any number of reasons to check in, not least for the 186-room hotel’s private access to Zhangyuan, a lively complex of restored shikumen, or lane houses, and rugged grey-stoned East-meets-West architecture dating back to the late 19th century – all progressively restored and reimagined into a lifestyle hub of restaurants, boutiques, galleries and, eventually, residences.

Unlike the low-slung profile of Alila Wuzhen – the brand’s other China property, located in a heritage water town in Zhejiang province – a vertical real estate is the name of the game in Shanghai. Guest rooms cascade upwards from the 12th to 17th and 27th to 39th floors, with a 2,626 sqft penthouse suite that commands the 39th floor like a glass-and-marble watchtower over the city’s sprawl.

After the cacophonic bustle of Shanghai, the hotel’s interiors are serene, the cocoon-like mood reinforced by walls of rough-hewn stone, vaulted ceilings, woven metallic panels and water features inspired by landscape portraits of the Northern and Southern Song Dynasties.

The result is a relaxing aerie that balances soft, scattered styles with precise, rigid geometries – a moment best experienced in the green-hued, wood and stone-lined spa whose organic, plant-based treatments are anchored with therapeutic water treatments including a hydrotherapy pool and Turkish bath.

The culinary programme includes a Japanese BBQ courtyard restaurant on the ground floor, a soigné tea house, and a rooftop bar with views over Zhangyuan.

Meanwhile, at 500 Weihai Road, which also happens to be the hotel’s street address, executive chef Scott Bao approaches Shanghainese cuisine like a precision instrument whilst harnessing ingredients harvested from the rooftop organic garden, as well as local producers. His deep-fried Mandarin fish is a calculated deconstruction of tradition that eschews the usual massive 1.5kg specimen in favour of a 300g portion that guarantees optimal flavour and portion control. The sauce? Organic tomatoes from local farms – because provenance matters.

Bao’s crispy chicken tells a similar story in which free-range birds marinated in ginger, garlic and spices proceed through a three-step cooking ritual involving first slow-cooking then air-drying, before they’re finished with a dousing of heated oil to achieve that perfect balance of crispiness and juicy succulence.

Alila’s next move? Dong’ao Island resort in Zhuhai in southern Guangdong province later this year. Stay tuned.

Alila Shanghai is located at 500 Weihai Road, Jing’an District, Shanghai, China; alilahotels.com. Rates: from RMB2,200.

Neuroaesthetics – the study of how visual arts, music and dance affect the human brain and cognition – may be a relatively new scientific field, but its outsized influence is already making waves with a new generation of creatives.

Exhibit A is the Chinese artist Duyi Han. A 2019 Cornell architecture graduate and alumnus of Herzog & de Mueron’s Basel HQ, he’s had a busy 2024, having collaborated with Dior on a mesmeric iteration of the iconic Lady Dior bag, and staging group exhibitions with Vienna’s 74tharts. And if you need more proof of his credentials, one of his pieces – Oxytocin cabinet – is already in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Ahead of the debut of his new work ‘Duyi Han: Visions of Bloom’ – an immersive reimagination of a secret Chinese garden through a psychedelic video and furniture installations, commissioned by the Shanghai-based non-profit art institution Cheruby – we talked to Han about the neuroaesthetic quality that is the foundation of his work.

Duyi Han speaks with Wallpaper* of neuroaesthetics and his Shanghai exhibition

Wallpaper*: Could we begin by explaining how neuroaesthetics underpins your work?

Duyi Han: Neuroaesthetics studies how visual art and visual input influence the brain’s emotional and cognitive responses. In each one of my major projects, there is a central theme based on the dimension of emotions. I want to project some certain kind of emotional state or states, and also evoke emotions in the audience. In other words, I aim to create a total aesthetic experience that has emotional functions. The emotions and feelings I address are usually ones that really matter to us as human beings and that are, often, what I also experience personally. The theme of mental health and wellness is obviously something I feel I have to explore.

W*: How does your work connect interior design and art with emotions?

DH: My work connects with people emotionally on intricate levels. But what I do is more than just designing something in a soothing colour so that people feel relaxed and well. I do extensive research into how we experience visual art, and experience places such as Unesco sites, or cultural moments that one might be already familiar with, such as music. I carefully curate the visual content in the interior, often mixing and remixing a lot of obvious and latent references which then become cognitive and emotional stimulations that help activate the experience of the visit. I think of my installations like the visual equivalent of a musical orchestra.

W*: What is the significance of the title of the show, ‘Visions of Bloom’?

DH: It’s a poetic brushstroke of the blossoming visuals of blossoming processes in the universe that you see and feel in this show. The equivalent Chinese title is different, but it conveys a similar sense of the visual experience.

W*: What inspired this installation?

DH: I really wanted to explore the feeling, or the state of mind, one has of seeing the world from a higher dimension. We humans have always tried to know more about our existence and about the universe through our scientific curiosity. I wanted to connect this curiosity with the attempt by some artists to achieve enlightenment in art, such as Zen paintings. It’s the connection between the process of nature and the universe, with the process of human art making. Nature and artifice, if you like.

W*: Tell us a little about how the video was created. The swirling patterns are so hypnotic.

DH: I animated and rendered the video myself. I've done similar formats in the past, some of which are on my website. The inspiration comes from past fashion campaign videos, music videos, and video art. For the music, I collaborated with two music artists, both of whom are inspired by Erik Satie (the influential 19th-century French composer and artist, known for his original, unconventional style).

W*: The show includes chairs embroidered with existential koans on mental health.

DH: This show is about something that has inspired my whole practice on an existential level: time, and how things change. Both the video and the embroidered chairs explore the processes and changes of the universe through different forms of visual media. For me, the furniture update a traditional ornament with contemporary mental health content. The media I use in this show also investigate how fashion brands use different formats to build their brand image, and how they also often using cultural and historic references.

W*: How has your architectural training influenced, if at all, your approach to your oeuvre?

DH: It’s helped develop my passion for the beauty and emotional experience of visiting places beyond just the architecture. But in a broad sense, I was influenced by the eclectic, OMA-inspired conceptual pedagogy at Cornell, and by the craft-and-phenomenology-focused approach at Herzog & de Meuron. I have also been inspired by the architecture and art I visited while studying in Rome. For example, the interior design of its historic churches is, in a way, a very developed and distilled way to influence human emotions.

W*: How does ‘Visions in Bloom’ stand apart from your neuroaesthetics-based work to date?

DH: This show is a rare instance where architecture, design, art, and video art all seamlessly come together. My curator Claire Shiying Li connected me with Cheruby because of its commitment to supporting artists who fuse art and fashion.

W*: What’s next?

DH: I’m in India until early December 2024 at the Shakti Design Residency – which connects emerging designers with artisanal Indian practices – where I am being mentored by the renowned Indian fashion designer, Tarun Tahiliani. I’ll be collaborating with local artists using traditional techniques such as hand embroidery. I’m also developing a few works that might show at Milan Design Week and Design Miami LA next year.

'Duyi Han: Visions of Bloom' opened during Shanghai Art Week, at Suhe Haus, 30 Wen An Road, Jing An, Shanghai, and runs from 8 November 2024 to 25 January 2025. www.duyihan.com

A-Cold-Wall*, the British fashion label founded by Samuel Ross, has unveiled a new flagship store in Shanghai, designed by London-based architecture studio Hesselbrand. The practice, whose previous collaborations in the fashion world involve retail design for Alyx, worked with an existing structure, which they stripped back to craft a highly bespoke and intensely ordered environment. The interior was thus transformed into the perfect canvas to display A-Cold-Wall* garments, which are inspired by an interplay of architecture and industrial design.

Inside the new A-Cold-Wall* Shanghai store

The new flagship is located in Zhangyuan, a 141-year-old cultural block in Shanghai. Preserving the building's historical façade, Hesselbrand's founding directors Magnus Casselbrant, Martin Brandsdal, and Jesper Henriksson opted for a unique approach to the industrial ‘look’ the client requested.

An industrial design aesthetic can involve rough-looking, utilitarian spaces, and as a result, it might be perceived as too stark and cold. Drawing on this but balancing it for the project's retail purposes, the practice took a conceptual approach, capturing spatial qualities that tap into a mix of visual references from large galleries, museums and factories. The store now boasts a grand and timeless feel, offering an alternative concept for its genre, while nodding to monumental architecture.

Hesselbrand also stripped back unnecessary decoration and instead focused on the arrangement of stone columns, hidden mirrors and screen walls throughout the interior. These elements are carefully illuminated and act as larger, stand-alone details that allow for an immersive experience that helps define the store's atmosphere.

'We began with inserting precise architectural elements in plan to create clarity and order. Columns give an overarching structure, while illuminated glass screens hint at the internal activity,’ Casselbrant explains. ‘Focused lighting reinforces the architectural rhythm while the more delicate cashier plinth and ottoman seating serve as anchor points for interaction.’

The use of juxtaposing materials of different textural qualities – such as rough, bush-hammered stone, sandblasted glass, brushed aluminium and woven steel mesh – presents a strong visual language that balances the tightrope between natural and industrial. Additionally, the space is easily adaptable to host exhibitions and events for the local community, a flexibility owed to the interior arrangement's precision and its calming rhythm throughout.

Henriksson says: ‘By turning what was an irregular space into a highly ordered environment, we are able to bring the A-Cold Wall* collection to the forefront of the store, allowing their cult following to truly interact with the essence of the brand. The space is open for interpretation and meant to act as a platform for forming meaningful connections within the community.’

a-cold-wall.com
hesselbrand.com

A pair of white stilettos ascend the stairs; a Kaj Franck glass imprisons a lanky spider; water overflows from the tub in a pink-tiled bathroom. Henni Alftan’s paintings inhabit a border between suspense and generosity from where her vignettes of everyday moments lure the viewer. The Paris-based Finnish artist intricately constructs eerily familiar instances with a painterly determination on form and colour – en route to rigorously constructed visions, however, she refuses to sacrifice a seductive ethereality. ‘I am not trying to paint an illusion – I am trying to do something that is recognisable, and as direct and simple as possible,’ she tells Wallpaper*.

Alftan’s paintings are subject to two solo exhibitions on opposite ends of the globe. This week, New York gallery Karma opens ‘Stop Making Sense’, which features 17 new works, some of which are diptychs. Longlati Foundation in Shanghai has recently opened ‘House of Mirrors’, the artist’s largest solo outing in Asia, with the same number of mostly new works in addition to those from two or three years ago.

In Black Umbrella (In-between) (2023) at Karma, the gap between the diptych’s two paintings eliminates the figure’s face, rendering her likeness as a forever mystery. Her large black umbrella and red sweater claim our complete attention. Bath (2024) at Longlati Foundation leaves its bathing protagonist behind a two-toned blue shower curtain, hinting at an inhabitant’s presence with their visible knees plunged into the tub.

Through windows cropped with a surgical precision, Alftan suggests outlooks into the boundless potential of painting, both as a medium and an act of cataloguing the imagination. The 45-year old’s juxtapositions perhaps largely owe their contagious magnetism to the honest illustration of their protagonists, all while their motivations and the surrounding circumstances remain strictly opaque.

The Note (2023) shows a piece of paper, carefully held by a hand, being calmly conquered by fire. The lack of any piece of writing on the sheet runs against the title’s suggestion; however, the harmony between the slow burn and the patience of the hand fuels a plethora of narratives to muse. ‘There is no story, unless you write it, and there is no right or wrong in your imagination,’ the artist adds.

Alftan experiments with geometric abstraction to convey architectural characteristics in vaguely occupied or completely empty interiors. The artist bases her compositions on sketches, to which is takes care to remain loyal in their translations into paintings. TV (2024) shows a brightly lit television screen in a dimly lit room without any broadcasting imagery. The blue couch in the corner is potentially occupied by a sitter, given the device is turned on, but the probability of a dweller is complicated by a completely emptied shelf unit.

Light claims the leading role in a suite of paintings, Arched Window (2023), Electric Light (2024), Red Sky (2024), Stairway III (2024). In them, Alftan configures the illumination’s hospitable yet alarming impact on interiors with dramatic coloration accents. Fluorescent hues of yellow or red vigorously penetrate into rooms or radiate from them.

Both shows crystallise Alftan’s devotion to explore her practice’s mental, physical, and chemical powers to remind the viewer of the reality of looking at a painting. Stripping her figures and places of any subjective signifiers, she monumentalises their archetypal impacts. ‘They are descriptions of what you are seeing, not of what will happen,’ explains Alftan, who always returns to her notebook of ideas for inspiration. The works’ ephemeral nature – despite her fastidious illustration of textures such as fuzzy, soft, or wet – stems from an unfettered relationship with documenting reality. Referring to the bruises on the figure’s knees in Knees (2023), she says, ‘Yes, they look like bruises but they are also simply stains of paint over another layer of paint.’

‘Stop Making Sense’ is open at Karma, New York, until 11 January 2025. ‘House of Mirrors’ is open at Longlati Foundation, Shanghai, until 18 January 2025

longlatifoundation.org, karmakarma.org

The New Bund 31 Performing Arts Center is tucked away between clusters of skyscrapers overlooking the bank of the Huangpo River in Shanghai. Designed by Neri & Hu (founded by Lyndon Neri and Rossana Hu) it is the latest addition to the city's ever-evolving cityscape. The theatre, which seats 2,500 people, is set to become a dynamic venue to host music, dance and theatre performances, as well as fashion, design and technology events.

Neri & Hu’s New Bund 31 Performing Arts Center

The project, its authors explain, aimed at creating an ‘arena’ that offers a ‘contemporary take on a classical archetype’. The result is dramatic but far from flashy, crafting an interior that is mesmerising in its curvature, and its five-storeyed seating. The warm oak provides a 'museum-like quality' that is further emphasised through the use of natural materials.

The lobby entrance nods to ancient Roman architecture, with colosseum-like terrazzo arches that stack around five storeys. The escalator space is crafted from glass blocks, giving an impression of elegant grandeur. Meanwhile, the cream façade is cool and calm, a delicate outer shell encasing the grand theatre.

The interior, lit by custom decorative fixtures, has a swirling form reminiscent of the inner workings of a grand piano, and enhancing the acoustics of each performance.

There is an additional event space, titled the 'black box', which is designed to host anything from conferences to exhibitions. Clad in blackened stainless steel, it stands in contrast to the glass-enclosed escalator.

With all the pre-show anticipation and the finding of seats, theatres can be a place of overstimulation. Through the use of organic materials, crisp lines and a soothing palette of colours, Neri & Hu have created a slice of calm before the curtain is raised.

neriandhu.com

Design Shanghai 2024, Asia's largest international design event, returned for its eleventh year this past June, showcasing curated exhibitors, features, and talks from across China.

The show took up the entire Expo Centre and featured over 600 design brands from more than 40 countries and regions, including international Western brands such as Gubi, Roche Bobois, Lube, Ethimo, and Lladró, as well as Stellar Works, which presented five new collections by Neri&Hu and Studio Stefan Scholten. Nonetheless, the strongest presence was clearly local.

The fair, while welcoming international and local manufacturers, brands, interior designers, architects, and enthusiasts, this year featured a fourth hall, New Materials and Applications, complementing last year’s three exhibition halls (Furniture and Lighting, Kitchen and Bathroom, Living and Lifestyle).

‘The show spotlights numerous global brands exhibiting for the first time and demonstrate the international rise of Chinese brands,’ Zhuo Tan, Event Director of Design Shanghai told Wallpaper* on the day of the opening. ‘Heritage is fundamental for Design Shanghai, we are a show rooted in China, and in Asia as well. What makes us meaningful is not only to bring here international brands, but also to really nurture Chinese brands who have a strong legacy, and the capacity to combine traditional craftmanship with a more modern desire,' she underlines.

The aim is to find what she describes as a language for China design. ‘In Asia, Japanese design is easily recognised and exported, but Chinese design remains somewhat blurred. As Design Shanghai, we have the responsibility to emphasize the Chinese design language and our heritage.’

Design Shanghai 2024: the Wallpaper* Highlights

Leading Chinese design brands

The public's interest in local brands was visible. Long lines formed in front of the booths of China's most popular design brands, such as U+, WhyGarden, and HC28 - all capable of personifying the spirit of the show, with an accent on specific local excellences and a look at more traditional lines and colours, but from a modern, young, and cross-cultural perspective.

U+, one of the most popular, is known for its minimalist style that is Chinese-infused, with a preference for dark wood, an ancient flavour, and clean and essential lines. HC28, which designed its booth to resemble a traditional Chinese courthouse, presented Frank Chou's latest sofa collection.

WhyGarden's booth theme was Air Flow, an homage to nature and calm living, represented by pieces such as the Callalily Lilly chairs and the Clover pouf. Another example is Kuno Design's Clogs Multifunctional Coffee Table, which combines semi-circular modules with a central pot and can be used as a standard round table, an S-shaped layout, a barbecue, a bonfire, or a decorative vase.

In China, there is a strong desire for the outdoors, which was reflected in the collections presented in Shanghai, according to Jacky Cheung, co-founder of the Italian and Hong Kong-based brand Livintwist, which featured natural shapes and playful pieces such as Boho, a hanging chair interlaced with hand-woven ropes.

For lights, the most interesting brand was Bias, founded in Shanghai in 2021, which this year presented its ‘electronic poetry’ with pieces such as Chaoxi-6, that uses programmable optoelectronic technology and the unwavering stability of an industrial aluminium die-cast casing to create a light comprising six modular units stacked and connected.

New design talents from China

Design Shanghai also presented several special projects, ranging from the so-called ‘Art Extension’ Neooold, curated by designer Chen Min, bringing together master and craft brands (including Aldo Bakker) presenting works that combined traditional local craftsmanship with modern art, to Talents, which featured 24 young and emerging designers experimenting with their personal balance of creativity and rationality.

For some of them, this meant looking at organic forms, with opposing results: on the one hand, Design Shanghai Talent Award winner Studio Ololoo's experimental approach to inflatable PVC embraced by a tensioned aluminium structure resulted in stools, a vase, and a lamp that had already won the SaloneSatellite Award in Milan last spring.

On the other hand, London-based Abid Javed of Objects Mito, a biologist by background, has created a delicate lamp using biomorphic forms and other materials such as Washi paper. Others focused on sustainability, such as Patch Design, which a chair made from upcycled plastic using 3D printing and hand weaving techniques, or decided to collaborate with local artisans, such as MingLi Design's sculptural lamps.

Materials First

Another highlight was the ‘Materials First’ installation, curated by materials expert Chris Lefteri and featuring cutting-edge materials, sustainable design, aesthetics, and functionality. It's a theme that, according to Lefteri, has spread beyond his installation and throughout the exhibition this year, with notable examples including Peelsphere, by Berlin-based textile designer Youyang Song, which uses fruit peels, coffee beans, waste grains, and algae to create a biodegradable plant-based alternative to leather.

Milo Wu used the traditional cloisonné enamel process to create Enclosed Enamel, a new material made by fusing industrial copper foam with enamel glaze.

Tokyo-based Sekisai Studio, which specialises in 3D printing technology, displayed customisable surfaces that appear to change colours depending on the viewer's position.

Sustainable Design China summit

The Sustainable Design China summit was an important event for Design Shanghai, Ms Zhou emphasised. The programme was overseen by Orianna Fielding, chief sustainability advisor and content director of Sustainable Design China Summit, and the talks covered a wide range of topics including urban regeneration and commercial practice, green hospitality, transition financing, architecture's carbon footprint, robotic and 3D printing, climate change and investment, transparency and ESG, and AI and data science in design.

‘In Design Shanghai, Thomas Heatherwick spoke about human-centred architecture, and I believe 60% of our speakers at this edition discussed well-being, sensitivity, and community connectivity with nature,’ says Fielding.

‘There is a new sensibility that invites us to go beyond the simple practice and incorporate the concept we are creating for ourselves as humans. This will shape future discussions in general, including the agenda for our next summit.’

designshanghai.com

Shanghai's Power Station of Art hosts a new retrospective exhibition of Estúdio Campana's work, marking the studio's first major exhibition in Asia.

Founded in São Paulo by Humberto Campana and his brother, the late Fernando Campana, the studio elevates humble materials and constructions to collectible design pieces whose aesthetic direction followed different motifs and visual themes. Their imaginative output has always been accompanied by a strong commitment to ethical design and supporting communities through their projects.

Impermanence - 40 Years of Estúdio Campana 

The exhibition is curated by Marco Sammicheli, Curator for Design, Fashion, Crafts and Director Museo del Design Italiano at Triennale Milano, and Gong Yan, Director of Power Station of Art.

'The work of the Campana brothers has transformed contemporary design,' comments Sammicheli. 'They were the first to intuit the richness of hybridizing creativity by giving dignity to scraps, waste and less noble materials so that the objects could portrait and attest desires: the ethics of recycling, the dignity of artisan work, the forgotten aesthetics of rural and indigenous Brazil, the madness of colours and shapes in the domestic landscape, the hybridization between production systems and ecological awareness.'

The exhibition offers an overview of forty years of the studio's output through fifty of their most iconic designs, recognisable furniture pieces that have helped shape the history of contemporary design while raising key issues of production, sustainability and our relationship with nature. 'In a forty-year career, Estúdio Campana has demonstrated the possibility of connecting decoration and political message, function and fiction, culture and nature,' continues Sammicheli.

Some of the studio's most memorable works are on display, from the Vermelha chair for Edra, made with over five hundred metres of red rope, and the Panda Puff stool, featuring as the name suggests a series of stuffed pandas in lieu of upholstery. There are some designs created for the Louis Vuitton Objets Nomades series and from the studio's collection for Paola Lenti, both vividly encapsulating the designers' flair for shape and colour. The displays also include personal objects, original drawings, and prototypes from the duo's history that had never been shown in public before.

The designs are shown within a cave-like scenography conceived by Humberto Campana, featuring white, artificial stalactites and stalagmites in reference to Plato’s "Allegory of the Cave".

'I wanted to combine the curators’ work with a child-like experience, which for me is the most accurate way of explaining how my brother and I trailblazed through life: by taking steps into dark, unknown territories, and shedding light into our explorations and findings,' explains Humberto Campana. 'Plato’s classic allegory is something we can all relate to, at any age or background. I like to think we are all born curious, and this scenography is an invitation to embrace estrangement, step away from your comfort zone, and be rewarded by the courage to let imagination run free in an adventurous search for joy.'

The exhibition experience is enriched by two screening rooms showing footage from the studio's archive, including their involvement in set design and a making-of video of the Vermelha chair, as well as the documentary “We The Others", by Francesca Molteni and Maria Cristina Didero.

A new installation by the studio also inaugurates PSA's 2000 square metres rooftop garden: created as a collaboration with Chinese garden designer Yuan Zheng and dubbed "Pyro", featuring firework-like structures in bamboo and steel that frame the view of the Shanghai skyline and integrate with the garden's landscaping.

'The creations of the Campana brothers originate from their optimistic embrace and imagination of life,' says Gong Yan. 'Their unique employment of materials and craftsmanship gives their design a quality of physical tactility that transcends mere functionality, embodying both an extension and a celebration of life itself. This exhibition also hopes to initiate a series of discussions on design, materials, traditions, and social concern.'

Impermanence - 40 Years of Estúdio Campana is on view until 8 September 2024

200 Hua Yuan Gang Lu
周家渡 Huangpu Qu
Shanghai
China, 200231

powerstationofart.com

Fotografiska Shanghai sits nestled into a green corner of the Chinese city's Suzhou Creek. Designed by AIM Architecture, the building shows off its layers of history, transformed from a former bank warehouse to a hub of art and culture for Shanghai residents and beyond. The structure, which brings together old and new, blending period patina and 21st-century styles and needs, in a building that was designed not as a conventional cultural space, but as 'a poetic immersion into the realm of visual narratives, woven through the lens of photography,' the architects explain.

Fotografiska Shanghai by AIM Architecture

The AIM Architecture team sought to restore and reimagine the previously neglected building in a considerate way. Its original structure was kept and cleaned up, revealing its bare bones. Original brickwork, concrete beams, and industrial details were unveiled and reused, creating a rich, multi-layered environment.

Beyond the project's flexible and generous exhibition areas and gallery halls, the new Fotografiska Shanghai also features a wealth of options to socialise and relax. The on-site restaurant, bar, retail space, and ice cream shop blend old and new features and offer culture lovers the opportunity to take a break, sit and discuss.

Two original, grand staircases in bare, textured concrete form the complex's main circulation cores. Their dual role means they are 'not only serving as navigational elements but also creating a dynamic light experience through movement leading guests from one display to another,' the architects write.

The top floor exemplifies the open and surprising nature of this multi-functional cultural hub. The highest level contains an open rooftop garden that combines open air and enclosed areas, including a bar, a cosy lounge, an exclusive VIP room, and a terrace with panoramic views of the Shanghai cityscape.

More opportunities to visit the building lay in its rich programme of activities. The architects add: 'Fotografiska Shanghai is not just a museum, it’s a cultural hub. Beyond exhibitions, it will host workshops, lectures, and events, fostering a community of artists, enthusiasts, and curious minds who share a passion for photography.'

The recently completed Fotografiska Shanghai by AIM Architecture is now open to visitors.

shanghai.fotografiska.com

aim-architecture.com

Molteni & C Shanghai showroom opens its doors in the heart of the city, marking a key moment for the Italian company's expansion in China. Set over two floors, the 3,500 square meters Shanghai Flagship is the new home for the Molteni Group, encompassing offices for the China-based team, a double offering of furniture by Molteni & C and UniFor, and an Art Gallery. On site is also Molteni & C's indoor-outdoor Restaurant to expand the guests' experience.

Molteni & C Shanghai showroom by Vincent Van Duysen

'When I started thinking about [Molteni & C Shanghai showroom], I wanted to create the atmosphere of a Palace, a succession of ordered rooms, perspectives that highlighted the grandeur of the building, being able to visually cross it on the two spatial axes, the longitudinal and the transverse one,' says Vincent Van Duysen, the company's creative director. 'Silent but refined spaces, always different from each other, in size and finishes connected by a sculptural staircase, with details that refer to Chinese culture, in the classic sober/elegant Molteni style.'

Van Duysen's concept was inspired by the existing Brutalist building where the showroom is located, creating a restrained industrial-style architecture that adapts to the company's evolving needs. The existing concrete columns were left exposed, in contrast with the refined interiors created by the architect featuring metal dividers and well-proportioned elements framing the furniture compositions, while a bronze spiral staircase connects the two floors. 

On the ground floor, the interiors are arranged like a sophisticated residence, with spaces for dining, sleeping, lounging and more, effectively demonstrating the breadth of Molteni & C's offering. Key pieces marking the showroom's opening are Van Duysen's Mateo Table,  the Porta Volta chair by Herzog & de Meuron and iconic Gio Ponti designs, including the D.154.2 armchair. Molteni & C's wardrobe and storage systems have a special role in the space, with Van Duysen's Gliss Master walk-in wardrobe in the bedroom offering an overview of the company's capabilities. 

Upstairs, the Art Gallery is dedicated to showcasing Molteni & C's 90 year-history with exhibitions on design icons including Gio Ponti and Ignazio Gardella. 

Through the gallery, guests can enter the UniFor space (passing through a large customized double-sided glass door of the RP partition system by Renzo Piano), conceived as a place for both displays and a workspace for architects to explore the possibilities of the company's application to large-scale bespoke projects. 

Finally, the Charcoal Restaurant becomes a place to showcase Molteni & C's outdoor furniture collections, curated by Van Duysen to reflect a contemporary Mediterranean approach to design, as well as timeless Gio Ponti furniture. 

Molteni & C, B3-B, No.19 Wangda Road, Huangpu District, Shanghai

molteni.it

Loewe Crafted World is a new exhibition exploring and celebrating craft in all its forms, on view at the Shanghai Exhibition Centre until 5 May 2024 (before traveling worldwide). The event marks Loewe's first public exhibition, and a way for the brand's creative director Jonathan Anderson to create 'a homage to all the craftspeople around the world that have dedicated their lives to the handmade.’ 

Loewe Crafted World: inside the exhibition

Featuring exhibition design by OMA, Loewe's Crafted World will offer an immersion into the house's designs and history, exploring the cultural collaborations that have shaped its trajectory from a leather-making collective founded in 1846 to a leading fashion company. The exhibition charts the history of Loewe through craft, both as a 178-year tradition but also as a means for creative collaboration and support of the industry, through initiatives such as the Loewe Foundation Craft Prize. 

The multimedia display touches upon Anderson's collections for the brand as well as Loewe's support of global craft, and includes a series of interactive roomscapes that bring to life the brand's inspirations.

The exhibition develops around six thematic chapters, each highlighting an element of Loewe's approach to craft. Born from the Hand tells the story of Loewe's early days and its evolution from leather workshop to global fashion house, while Welcome to Spain explores its roots taking visitors through the sights and sounds of the country brought to life via photography, of contemporary and historical landmarks and national artefacts. 

At The Atelier, visitors are walked through the steps that make a Loewe bag, from the selection of leathers to a painstaking process of cutting, trimming, painting and assembling by hand. Spectacularly, this section of the exhibition ends with a two-metre tall reproduction of the brand's Howl’s Moving Castle bag, interpreting the 2004 Studio Ghibli film through traditional craft and contemporary flair. 

A chapter dedicated to Anderson's fashion collections (Fashion Without Limits) is followed by United in Craft, a moment in the exhibition 'celebrating the joy of making things with one’s hands,' where the works from the annual Loewe Foundation Craft Prize are on display, demonstrating the breadth of the award's scope and of Loewe's support for artisanal techniques. 

Finally, Unexpected Dialogues is a nine-room exploration of Loewe's inspirations from the past ten years, including a recreation of a New Mexico pottery studio, a jade quarry (a nod to Loewe's most recent Lunar New Year collection), a life-sized Joe Brainard, and more Studio Ghibli, with a dreamworld bringing to life their aesthetics and motifs. Finally, three spaces are dedicated to 19th-century British Arts & Crafts, with the work of William Morris, William De Morgan and CFA Voysey each presented in a dedicated space with larger-than-life effects. 

Loewe Crafted World is on view until 5 May 2024

Shanghai Exhibition Centre
no. 1000 Middle Yan'an Road

loewe.com

The Artyzen Hospitality Group may have been founded in 2013 and its first property, the Artyzen Habitat Dongzhimen Beijing, launched in 2017; but in very short order, the brand now boasts thirteen hotels, two of which have just opened in Shanghai and Singapore, right on time to mark its tenth anniversary. 

By any yardstick, it’s a prodigious output, not least because of the group’s penchant for collaborating with blue-chip architects and designers. That, and the willingness of its owner, Pansy Ho, the formidable daughter of casino tycoon Stanley Ho, to support the expansion with seemingly endless injections of cash.

Artyzen New Bund 31 Shanghai and Artyzen Singapore

Artyzen New Bund 31 Shanghai, for instance, is a statuesque tower of shimmering glass and steel set in the New Bund 31 mixed-used development on the edge of the Huangpu River. Here, Neri&Hu Design and Research Office has dressed the high-ceilinged interiors of the public spaces, sweeping outdoor terraces, and 202 rooms in a palette of low-key mod-Chinoiserie by way of shades of blues and greys with copper hues and low-slung blonde timber furniture.

Incredibly, Artyzen New Bund 31 is the group’s eighth property in Shanghai, a city its senior VP, Peter Wynne, describes as the ‘launch pad to leading premium lifestyle experiences in the region’ – to wit, an ever-expanding fleet of serviced apartments, restaurants and bars, and conference centres. 

An equally potent sign of the group’s ambitions to be a bona fide heavyweight hospitality player is the debut of Artyzen Singapore, its first hotel outside China.

Located across the road from the newly minted Moshe Safdie-designed Edition Singapore, the 142-room property is a genuine crowdpleaser. Tapping into Singapore’s ongoing love affair with biophilic architecture, local studio Ong&Ong have created a low-rise pile that’s cut out with triple-volumed sky gardens, cool, shaded terraces, and a 25-metre long, rooftop infinity pool with sweeping views clear across Singapore’s north green belt and Malaysia in the hazy distance.

Inside, the Sydney-based interior designer Nic Graham has concocted a confection of mood-lit barrel-vaulted room sets that he’s furnished with Straits Settlement motifs, woven wicker, and dramatic, high-arched doorways inset with mirrors and draped with huge baskets of ferns and tropical greens.

For Artyzen, the two new Shanghai and Singapore hotels – which it’s marketing as ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ – are part of a larger goal to lock in the 1.8bn-strong Millennial and Gen Z sectors of the hospitality market. ‘They’ve always been our focus,’ says Wynne unapologetically, ‘and we see Artyzen Singapore as a launch pad to expand our presence into South East Asia.’

For now, Artyzen is keeping its expansion strategy close to its chest, but a to-do list that includes at least five new hotels in the next ten years is not too far-fetched, Wynne already on record that he’d like to see an Artyzen hotel in a key European city such as London or Lisbon.

artyzen.com

Shanghai artist Cui Jie is known for her sleek, architectural paintings of China’s ever-changing urban landscapes – so the infinite nothingness of space may, at first, seem an unlikely destination for her. Born at the beginning of the 1980s, during the onset of China’s Open Door policy and the rapid development of its cities, Jie explores this frenetic growth and the accompanying sense of spatial disorientation in her work. For the Shanghai Biennale 2023, however, the event's 14th edition, the artist has left terra firma behind, with three paintings made between 2019 and 2020 that respond to this year’s theme, Cosmos Cinema.

Cui Jie at the 14th Shanghai Biennale

In these works there is little of the imposing, densely layered configurations of glass and steel for which Jie is arguably best known. Instead, each large-scale canvas (the biggest more than two metres long) is immediately striking for its sparseness. In International Space Station (2019), the orbiting laboratory’s skeletal form is only partially distinguished from the dark void that otherwise dominates the canvas, while in The Rainfall Pavilion and the Lakeside Pavilion (2019), Jie selectively illuminates certain angles of a façade, with single lines merely suggesting the rugged outline of a shadowy surrounding landscape. 

Both works demonstrate Jie’s interest in territorial sovereignty and the intersection of competing national interests. In her first London solo exhibition, in 2019 at Pilar Corrias, for example, ‘From Pavilion to Space Station’, Jie drew from the layered history of pavilions built on Victoria Peak, a prominent hill in Hong Kong, that hybridise the architectural legacies of Japanese, British and Chinese rule. The illuminated fragments of a building in The Rainfall Pavilion and the Lakeside Pavilion are in fact taken from one such pavilion, built by Hong Kong architect Chung Wah-nan, whose work has often been referenced by the artist. Similarly, the International Space Station is intended as a symbol of global cooperation, but as Russia’s impending departure demonstrates, it also operates as a place of conflict. 

Base station #2 (2020) completes the trio of paintings: a satellite mast extending into a dramatic night sky. As often in her work, Jie’s use of colourful underpainting is revealed at the margin of the canvas, swirls of vibrant pools that echo the clouds at its centre. With their gestural forms, these clouds stand in contrast to the sharp geometric lines of the mast and gridded, graph-paper appearance of Jie’s paintings. Like the satellite and the space station, both key communicative infrastructures, these grids serve as the digital webs of data flow that defy international boundaries and, for better or worse, bind us together. Jie’s work reveals how these ties now extend into the cosmos, ready to shape an uncertain future.

The 14th Shanghai Biennale, Cosmos Cinema, runs until 31 March 2024 at the Power Station of Art, powerstationofart.com

Design Shanghai 2023, Asia’s largest design fair, returned for its 10th edition in June, and this year proved to be one of the most expansive yet. 600 brands and studios hailing from China and 40 other countries set up shop at Shanghai’s Expo Center in riverside Pudong. 

Over the four days, in addition to the product launches and brand presentations, Design Shanghai organised talks by international designers such as Neri&Hu’s Rossana Hu, Zandra Rhodes and Ross Lovegrove; curated exhibitions, including a survey of contemporary weaving in China; and hosted an off-site partner festival in the Xintiandi district that inserted interactive design installations by up-and-coming names across the busy shopping district.

While there was a significant presence of international brands — like Acerbis, Christofle and Gubi, all of whom were debuting new projects in Asia — the fair’s main draw was the homegrown talent. As the first edition since visitors have been able to freely travel to the country since the pandemic, the wealth of new studios, many having opened in the past three years, proved rich. 'If you are a designer and you are in China at this moment, you are lucky,' Zhuo Tan, the fair’s founder, told Wallpaper*. 'Because now is the golden age of Chinese design.'

HIGHLIGHTS FROM DESIGN SHANGHAI 2023

Talents Section

Among the feature presentations, one of the most anticipated was the Talents exhibition, a cross-section of up-and-coming designers and studios predominantly based in China. Twenty-two independent studios were chosen by designer Frank Chou and, unsurprisingly, the selection represented a wide range of concepts and ideas. 

From File Studio’s jigsaw-like furniture made of coloured metal sheets to Restudio’s slouching textile-based vessels composed of traditional cloth produced by the Dong people of southern China, which won the Best Experimental Product Design award. Another highlight was envy envy’s ‘Beat’ collection, formed of square aluminium tubes that have been strategically battered, named Best Art Product Design.

Frank Chou

As the curator of the Talents section, Frank Chou had a significant presence at the fair, but his own contribution was also of particular note. Chou riffed on classic Bauhaus-style design with his Stand coffee table, composed of a low, round body with a glass top, it trades the movement’s typical palette of utilitarian materials with soft upholstered wool, proving a particularly effective contrast. 

Bias

Recently-launched lighting brand Bias was one of the most captivating we found at Design Shanghai. Founded in 2021, Bias debuted the first standing floor lamp in their Chao-Xi collection, the Chaoxi-6. Utilising industrial aluminium die-cast casing, the spindly lamp is formed of six stacked modular units that have been programmed to softly pulse roughly at the rate of human breath, meant to elicit a feeling of calm.

U+

The line to enter U+’s stand, one of China’s most popular furnishing brands, was amongst the longest at the fair. Their sprawling booth contained many of their most popular designs, but much of the attention was on the latest launch, the Rong Armchair designed by Shen Baohong. Formed of a slim, stainless steel frame with a smooth leather seat and narrow backrest, the defining feature is the wire-thin armrest supports, which are tightly twisted similar to the neck of a coat hanger. 

Papa Furniture

Four-year-old brand Papa was present at the fair with a colourful booth reminiscent of a circus tent complete with an oversize disco ball hanging in the centre, which threw swatches of light onto their showing of colour-blocked chairs, screen and stools. However, the brand’s latest launch, the DouDou designed by Yuyao Zhou — a solid wood dining chair with softly curved lines, a woven wool seat and a bright, lacquered wood finish — was front and centre.

While the industry and media spotlight on Auto Shanghai 2023 and its key reveals made April a good time to launch a swathe of new production cars, the Chinese auto show was also host to several intriguing concepts. Our pick of the show ranges from far-future dreams to lightly disguised new production models.

Auto Shanghai 2023 concept cars

Lancia Pu+ra HPE concept

Lancia has languished in the doldrums for years – decades, even. Now part of Stellantis, the ailing Italian company hopes to break out of its design funk with this dramatic new concept car. The Lancia Pu+ra HPE concept draws its key inspiration from the Stratos, the wedge-shaped Bertone-designed rally car from 1971 that still looks futuristic today.

This new vision shares some of that razor-sharp 1970s optimism, an assemblage of geometric forms that’s intended to signpost the way for new electric models, including a new compact Ypsilon and Delta mid-size model. If Lancia can bottle just a fraction of the vivacious spirit of its past, as celebrated in the Pu+Ra’s airy retro-futurist forms, it’ll have a chance to rise again. 

Lancia.com

Citroën Autonomous Mobility Vision

Citroën’s Autonomous Mobility Vision is built on a modular platform, the Citroën Skate, an autonomous electric module that can be decked out with an interchangeable set of ‘pods’, ranging from personal transportation units to stores and entertainment venues. Three new visions were created specifically for China and shown in Shanghai. Future cities buzzing with mobile venues is a popular vision, but the more practical applications of a system like the Skate is for cargo carrying and deliveries – the alternative has the potential to become another form of tourist rickshaw, hardly the most welcome vehicle in any urban environment. 

That said, the Immersive Air, Cozy Capsule and Wander Café shown here are undeniably more exciting than a courier van. The first is a kind of mobile karaoke booth or spot for meetings on the move. The Cozy Capsule is an upscale taxi module, while the Wander Café offers ‘tasting experience while cruising through cityscapes’, complete with Bird’s Nest Stadium-inspired canopy.  

Citroen.com

Nissan Max-Out and Arizon Concepts

Nissan’s conceptual duo were chalk and cheese. The Max-Out EV convertible sports car concept is a stunning vision of a future electric roadster, awash with neat design touches, a fluid one-piece body that offers an alternative to the long-bonnet proportions of a ‘traditional’ sports car. Touches like the parabolic hologram wheels are pure theatre.

In contrast the Arizon SUV was rather more conventionally shaped. Previewing a future SUV for the Chinese market, the Arizon incorporates a virtual personal assistant (VPA), Eporo, as well as a spacious cabin accessed via clamshell-style doors. Expect VPAs to become a core part of future automotive offerings, as manufacturers seek to imbue EVs with a distinct personality. 

Nissan-Global.com

Toyota bZ Sport Crossover and bZ FlexSpace Concepts

Toyota also debuted two new concepts, both of which had a whiff of realism about them. The bz Sport Crossover Concept looks like a natural evolution of the company’s bZ4X EV, while the bZ FlexSpace Concept simply takes the design language established by Toyota’s debut EV and upscales it. The result is, finally, a readymade family of tasteful electric vehicles from the world’s second largest car manufacturer.

Global.Toyota

This week sees Auto Shanghai 2023 (until 27 April) hold sway as China’s largest motor show and a reminder of the industry’s ongoing gravity shift to the East. Alongside a host of new models from Chinese manufacturers, many long-established players chose the event to showcase new flagship models. Even those companies that didn’t exhibit still picked this month to unveil new metal, mindful of the danger of being seen to be standing still. Of course, EVs continue to dominate, and crossovers and SUVs continue to be the car type of choice. Read on to discover the key cars of 2023 and beyond.

Auto Shanghai 2023: the key reveals

MG Cyberster

As the MG4 brings new sophistication to the Chinese-owned, once-British brand, the next model looks even more intriguing. MG’s new Cyberster is a two-seater, open-topped EV due to launch in 2024. Bigger and bolder than its ancestral inspiration, the Cyberster will create a whole new category and shift the perception of EVs in the process. 

MG Cyberster, available Summer 2024, MG.co.uk

Lincoln Nautilus

Distinct Range Rover vibes from Lincoln’s 2024 Nautilus, which broke cover in New York earlier this month. The new Nautilus features a 2-litre turbocharged hybrid powertrain across the trim levels, indicating that even in the land of the enormous SUV, attitudes are slowly shifting away from vast petrol engines as a signifier of power and luxury. It’s still a very big car, suggesting there’s still a long way to go before opulence is equated with downsizing. 

Lincoln Nautilus, available in North America, early 2024, Lincoln.com

BMW i7 M70 xDrive

A new electric flagship for BMW, which has given its electric 7-Series sedan the ‘M’ power treatment for the first time. Like the other mighty electric BMW, the XM, the company is going all out on brutalism right now. The bluff front, two-tone paintwork and radically re-shuffled light and grille elements take some getting used to. Owners can bask in the knowledge that this BMW’s fastest accelerating EV, with an accompanying Hans Zimmer-composed ‘engine note’. Long distance travellers can switch on a hair-shirted MAX RANGE mode to eke out the best from the battery (nearly 350 miles) 

BMW i7 M70 xDrive, available from Q3 2023, BMW.co.uk

Volkswagen ID.7

The latest in VW’s fast-expanding ID range is the ID.7, a limo-sized slippery-shaped four-door. The ID.7 majors on efficiency, with a projected maximum range of over 400 miles, as well as well as a host of luxury extras to tempt fleet buyers and executives to go electric. These include massage chairs apparently approved by the German Campaign for Healthier Backs, a dimmable glass sunroof, and remote parking with a memory function. 

Volkswagen ID.7, launching Europe and China Autumn 2023, Volkswagen.co.uk

HiPhi X

Chinese brand HiPhi is ready its X crossover for European sales, soon to be followed by the Z grand tourer (a ‘digital GT’). There’s also a larger HiPhi Y in the works. Boldly styled, the X has rear-hinged rear doors and a gullwing roof hatch. Inside there’s a central info screen on a multi-axis robot arm – it’s described as the ‘HiPhi Bot’. The brand is a best-seller in China and wants to make a similar impact in the European market. 

HiPhi X, details tbc, HiPHi.com

BYD Dolphin, Seal and Yangwang U9

BYD has been selling EVs in the UK for over a decade, albeit in a lowkey way. That effort will now be ramping up. Using defiantly different naming conventions, BYD (‘Build Your Dreams’) is also making an aggressive play for European drivers with two new mid-market cars, the Seal saloon and Dolphin hatchback. With fluid, vaguely fishy design language and batteries built in-house by the Chinese conglomerate, the new cars go head to head with offerings from Stellantis and Ford.

BYD’s luxury subsidiary, Yangwang, also showed its new sports coupé, the U9. With bodywork designed by Wolfgang Egger, formerly head of design at Audi and now doing the same role for BYD, the car promises extraordinary performance and a smart suspension system capable of running on just three wheels in the event of a blowout. 

BYD Dolphin, available from June 2023, BYDEurope.com

Yangwang U9, details tbc, YangwangAuto.com

Mercedes-Maybach EQS 680 SUV

You’d have to travel back to the plutocratic excesses of the 1970s to find a comparable model to the new Mercedes-Maybach EQS 680 SUV. Only the legendary Mercedes-Benz 600 (the Grosser Mercedes) comes close to the scale and scope of this, Maybach’s first all-electric model. 

Based on MB’s EQS, the Maybach ramps up the craftsmanship and CEO-level extras, including folding worktables, a cooling compartment, silver-plated champagne goblets, along with ventilated, heated and massage functions in all four seats. The interior is a butterscotch symphony of LED lights, sustainably produced leather and wood trim. 

Mercedes-Maybach EQS 680 SUV, Mercedes-Benz.com

Genesis GV80 Coupé Concept

The GV80 Coupe calls itself a concept but you can consider it a relatively faithful representation of the South Korean luxury manufacturer’s next model. Revealed at the brand’s Genesis House HQ in New York, the GV80 Coupe takes the companies largest model, the GV80 SUV, and gives it the contemporary fastback body shape. No word yet about potential powertrains but expect the GV80 to go beyond its sister car’s lack of hybridisation - perhaps even taking inspiration from the company’s best model, the GV60 EV. 

Genesis GV80 Coupe, currently concept only, Genesis.com

Lamborghini Revuelto

Another non-show debut, Lamborghini chose to reveal its next generation super sports car on its own terms. The story here is hybridisation, and the Revuelto is billed as the first series production V12 plug-in hybrid. Lamborghini has always been bullish about the enduring appeal and regulations-busting qualities of its internal combustion engines. However, recent moves by the US Environment Protection Agency to do away with exemptions for Small Volume Manufacturers to meet wider CO2 reduction targets might end up forcing the company's hand. 

In any case, the famous Sant-Agata Bolognese-based brand is equipping the Revuelto with a battery pack big enough to encourage electric-only driving, although there’s no word of what the likely range will be if you put your foot down. 

Elsewhere, you’ll find extensive use of ultra-light carbon fibre, dramatic doors and all the angles and creases that have come to define this most defiant of sports car brands. The Revuelto will continue the family line that started by the Countach in 1974, going through the Diablo, Miura, Murciélago and Aventador models. 

Lamborghini Revuelto, on sale in 2024, Lamborghini.com

Ford Explorer

Ford is splicing its pioneering American DNA with the more technologically adventurous spirit of its European arm with a new all-electric version of the Ford Explorer. Designed and engineered in Europe, it takes the clunky family-focused SUV into a zero-emissions future. The aesthetics are a bit more car-like than the original Explorer’s infamous truck inspired shape, and Ford is pushing the new model’s fast-charge ability, spacious interior and rugged, adventurous image. 

Ford Explorer, available from late 2023, Ford.co.uk

Denza N7

Denza is yet another BYD offshoot. The new N7 is passably handsome, if a bit forgettable, and although Denza describes the car as an SUV, it’s more crossover in terms of scale and height. As BYD’s first model to include a suite of LiDAR sensors the N7 is suitably future proofed, but what interests us most is the brand’s collaboration with audio tech manufacturer Devialet. The French brand’s first foray into automotive audio, the N7 includes a 16-speaker system that has been tailor-made for its interior. 

Denza N7, China only, TengshiaAuto.com

Smart #3

Shaped by the Mercedes-Benz global design team, the new Smart #3 is the company’s ‘first ever sports utility coupé’. On the plus side, this means it’s substantially smaller than other cars with this unwieldy and slightly meaningless designation. On the downside, it looks a teensy bit generic. Smart claims this is due to the car’s ‘seamless, smooth lines and athletic curves,’ but there’s none of the eccentricity that defined the brand back in its early days. The seamless swoop of the roof makes up for the otherwise disappointing shape; perhaps when it’s lined up alongside its larger rivals will it all start to make sense. Aimed squarely at a young city-dwelling driver, interior equipment includes a music system tuned by Beats. 

Smart #3, availability tbc, Smart.Mercedes-Benz.com

Porsche Cayenne

Porsche have given their venerable Cayenne a substantial overhaul with the aim of seeing it through until the launch of an all-electric replacement. Minimal exterior changes are supplemented by a massive overhaul of the interior architecture. Cayenne now gets a dashboard-wide screen system, a new ‘Porsche Driver Experience’ that balances analogue displays with digital content, as well as giving the front seat passenger their own touchscreen to play with. The V6 hybrid models have also been updated, and now offer a much longer electric-only range and greater efficiency. 

Porsche Cayenne, available to order now, Porsche.com

Huang Wenjing and Li Hu came of age as architects in New York, after they graduated from Beijing’s Tsinghua University in the 1990s. It was there – while Li was at Steven Holl Architects and Huang at Pei Cobb Freed & Partners – that they had the idea of starting their own practice. Having gained more experience and a clearer understanding of architecture, the pair eventually opened their Beijing office, Open Architecture, in 2008, the year of the Beijing Summer Olympics, on one of the capital’s distinctive hutongs; their office is still there today.

The name Open Architecture was inspired by the type of open-source computer hardware or software that allows a simple, free and customizable interchange of components. One of the pair’s earlier projects, Beehive Dorm, a 2009 modular building system made from prefabricated steel-framed hexagonal cells, could be seen as a direct architectural realization of this principle.

The practice’s breakthrough project was the Beijing No.4 High School Fangshan Campus (widely known as the ‘Garden School’) in 2014. At the time, local authorities were aiming to move away from standard inner city schools – a big block adjacent to a vast, usually empty field – and build schools with more natural outdoor environments. ‘There is a huge demand for better education as the population is getting more affluent, and we wanted to create a new typology for schools,’ says Li. Open’s design placed communal facilities, such as the canteen, auditorium and gymnasium, underground, while covering the site with gardens that reached over the rooftops, giving a view of nature to the students and staff in the classrooms, laboratories and offices.

This unconventional approach to space redefined the various formal and informal educational areas, and led to new thinking about openness, interaction and creativity in a learning environment. With Shanghai’s Qingpu Pinghe International School in 2020, the studio took the theme further by turning the campus into a village with 13 buildings stretching across a landscaped, 50,350 sq m site that included a library and theatre called the Bibliotheater, which is open to the public. It was a site-specific solution to local needs – as all their projects are.

When Open Architecture launched, China was facing an explosion of urban development that brought plentiful opportunities – even though this came hand in hand with a fair amount of chaos. ‘On our return, we had to readjust ourselves culturally to the way we work. We used to struggle with the lack of definition and clarity in many situations,’ Huang recalls. ‘But then we learnt to first identify the problems in the chaos and then see what the possibilities were.’ A unique challenge for architects in China is that they are often commissioned to create a cultural building without knowing its eventual contents or even its intended use. ‘In tandem with China’s economic boom and rapid urbanisation, the country is at a point when we need more cultural buildings; there is a strong push from the top down, but there are not enough local creatives yet,’ says Li.

For Shenzhen’s 2019 Pingshan Performing Arts Center, the design brief was extremely limited – a grand theatre was needed for a newly developed district. Yet, conversely, the lack of specifics gave the architects the freedom to project their own vision for the building – an institution that connected with the general public and enriched everyday urban life. Huang and Li studied the country’s theatres and assembled a team of experts to put in place a comprehensive scheme for both the building design and its future programming. So successful was their proposal that it was adopted by the site’s operators once they took over.

As one of the leading players in a new generation of Chinese architects, Open is now defining the nation’s built environment on its own terms, understanding both the existing culture and its future potential. As a research-based practice, it conceives its work along two parallel lines that inform each other: one is studying to produce ideas and critiques, and the other designing buildings that generate revenue for them.

Adaptive reuse is one of Open’s key areas of research, as another recent project displays. Along the banks of Shanghai’s Huangpu River, now the West Bund Culture Corridor, was a dilapidated site with five decommissioned aviation fuel tanks and other forgotten relics of the city’s former airport. Paying tribute to the site’s industrial past, while also seeking to dissolve conventional perceptions of art institutions with formidable walls, they created Tank Shanghai, an art centre-cum-open park, in 2019. The tanks are now linked via a new basement, while two new gallery spaces sit in the surrounding landscape. Lush greenery laces the different elements in the 47,450 sq m site. Called the ‘Super-Surface’, it provides much-needed parkland in a city that is less than 20 per cent green space. The site has since seen a return of urban wildlife. 

‘We had trouble documenting the space because the photographers can’t see where the architecture is,’ adds Huang. ‘But we embedded some hints throughout the landscape – there is an oculus and openings on the tanks that suggest activities; most of the architecture is happening inside.’ A similar gesture can be experienced at the 2018 UCCA Dune Art Museum, located on a quiet beach in Qinhuangdao. Resembling a primeval habitat, it is a series of connected cave-like structures beneath the sand dunes, each housing a different space. Skylights bring nature into the underground structures, which offer shelter for the body and soul.

Their designs have a lot to do with coexisting with nature, says Huang, and one of their latest works is a fitting example. Extruded from remnants of the Great Wall, the 2021 Chapel of Sound is a semi-outdoor concert hall situated in an uninhabited valley in Chengde. It was designed in pursuit of the purest experience of sound. The chapel’s exterior is a rugged mix of concrete and crushed local rock that feels otherworldly and timeless; its layered structure made it simple to build (and thus feasible in its remote location) while echoing the striated rock formations of the nearby mountains. The compact structure houses a semi-outdoor amphitheatre and an alfresco stage, including a rooftop viewing ‘plateau’ looking over the valley and nearby Great Wall. In the words of the architects, its existence is ‘collecting, reflecting and resonating with nature’.

Currently under construction in Yantai, Shandong, the Sun Tower is a key upcoming project: a monolith with a similarly unearthly presence. Its conical form is sliced open to create a half-enclosed structure, its floors connecting to a winding exhibition space to be filled with digital contents. At the top of the tower is an expanse that looks over the splendours of the natural world; water features in the plaza beneath pay homage to the 24 solar terms of the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar, and a water channel marks the equinoxes.

The Sun Tower is destined to be a landmark; Li also wants it to ‘evoke the ancient rituals of nature-worship while providing much-needed cultural facilities in the newly urbanized district’. Open Architecture seeks to meet people’s physical, cultural and aesthetic needs, while avoiding the often overwhelming bureaucratic and financial obstacles that still hamper architectural development in China. The practice flourishes because it seamlessly weaves social benefit into its creations. The pair conclude: ‘We hope we can bring out the multifaceted nature of China. What we have come to realize is that people have many more similarities than differences in how they want their lives to be.’

INFORMATION

Open Architecture’s monograph, Reinventing Cultural Architecture, written by Catherine Shaw (£35, Rizzoli), is out now

openarch.com

A version of this article appears in the May 2022 issue of Wallpaper*. Subscribe today!

The first phase of Heatherwick Studio’s 1000 Trees has finally opened in Shanghai, unsurprisingly a couple of years behind schedule (thanks to the pandemic) but as verdant and striking as the name and early renders suggested. The mixed-use development takes up just part of a 15-acre site bounded to the north by Suzhou Creek and by the M50 art district to the south. From the river, the building is deliberately hard to read, a 60m tall, gently sloping, terraced jumble of horizontally striped stone and towering planters in unapologetically raw and rippled concrete.

For studio founder and head Thomas Heatherwick, 1000 Trees reimagines large-scale urban developments as open, social spaces rather than blank monolithic boxes or towers. ‘Many big buildings just feel cold, sterile and monotonous on the outside,’ he says, ‘so our challenge was to create something engaging on a human scale.’

1000 Trees: the first phase

Based around a 9m grid, the building twists 45 degrees to get maximum river views. The studio’s biggest idea, though, was leaving the development’s giant supporting columns on the outside and turning them into those planted podiums, exposed sections of cliff topped with trees, shrubs, grasses, flowers and climbers. The exoskeleton device allows for more open and lighter space inside but also means, says Heatherwick, that shops, restaurants, galleries, even a kindergarten all have outdoor terraces. The building is also deliberately porous, and accessible from multiple angles with walkways at various levels. Heatherwick likens it to a termite mound.

‘We felt an enormous responsibility to make sure that commerce not be its only atmosphere and to make a community heart,’ he says, ‘that it has a diversity of places to explore and is somewhere that people can just be.’ (The design was, of course, plotted long before the Covid-19 pandemic – Heatherwick nods to the influence of Jan Gehl, the Danish architect, urbanist and author of Life Between Buildings and Public Spaces, Public Life – but that provision of outdoor space now looks beyond prescient.)

1000 Trees, though, has also become a lightning rod for a lively debate in the architectural press about the positives and not-so-positives of ‘urban greening’. Those for verdant buildings argue that their plants and trees increase biodiversity, lower temperatures, suck in CO2 and other pollutants, reduce noise and generally lift the spirits. Critics argue that those benefits are far outweighed by the carbon output of building in concrete and steel, and that maintaining green walls and roofs is resource intensive, though living walls are far more at fault here. Heatherwick Studio says the planting on 1000 Trees is all local, will change with the seasons and has been carefully researched and picked to minimise pruning and maintenance.

Heatherwick and Lisa Finlay, the studio’s group lead on the 1000 Trees project, say another key priority was engaging with the low-level reused warehouses and industrial buildings of the M50 art district on the other side of the development. ‘The planning regulations clearly expected us to build a huge tower on a podium, but that would have made a mockery of the art district,’ says Heatherwick. ‘The most respectful thing we could do was to come to meet it at street level and at its scale, to blur that boundary as much as we could.’

The much less discussed south-facing façade, then, is essentially an angled display space for local art especially commissioned for the building by French street artist and M50 champion Paul Dezio. Local artists have also been invited to create 40m-high murals inside the building’s elevator shafts, visible from glass cars. Heatherwick says the artwork is ‘an acknowledgement that no one designer should be allowed to do projects this big. They need to be diverse. Single brains will create something that is too much of one thing.’

An external glass lift, meanwhile, is housed in a tower of weathered Cor-ten steel blades, a shimmery echo and reimagining (and repositioning) of part of a flour mill that once stood on the site. ‘The city said they wanted to remember that there was a mill there and asked us to rebuild its tower,’ explains Heatherwick. ‘Initially, everyone said “No, we can’t do that. It’s kitsch, it’s ridiculous.” But then we thought, this is an enormous project, the more idiosyncrasy the better, so how do we keep this memory but make it useful?’

For Heatherwick, the steel tower exemplifies the studio’s mission to build the strange and unexpected into its large-scale developments. ‘I deeply believe in not copying the past but I'm really proud of the tower. We're really interested in how we build, in what typically gets eradicated, and not creating sterile dead places. Everyone loves clean lines but clean lines are actually boring. So how do you get dirty lines?’ The entire 1000 Trees plot is bisected by a road, and phase two of the development, another forested urban mountain but this one 100m tall, is now under construction. The new development, which has to work its way around four existing heritage buildings, will include workspace, a cinema, a hotel, as well as a large park and an amphitheatre.

Finlay says the team will now be studying how people use phase one of the development, alert to the fact that the pandemic has permanently shifted behaviour and needs in dense urban areas. ‘We want to do a lot of monitoring over the next year,’ says Finlay, ‘and look at how the terraces and spaces are actually being used. It might be used in completely different ways to what we imagined, so let’s find out.’

INFORMATION

heatherwick.com

An abandoned pump house outside Shanghai has been transformed into an architectural pavilion with a nod to the sacred, courtesy of Chinese architecture studio Wutopia Lab. The project, created at an idyllic spot within the Dongtanyuan's Qian Shao Farm, belonging to food and beverage multinational the Bright Food Group, is titled Shrine of Everyman, and reimagines a neglected piece of industrial architecture into an exploration of sacred space – an ethereal folly that invites the visitor in, as if in a dream.

The project’s brief outlined a rest stop for visitors and passers-by. The architects applied their signature flair and imagination – which has previously led to designs such as imaginative bookstores for Tianya Books and beautifully geometric exhibition centres, such as the The Aluminium Mountain – to their architectural solution, resulting in a reflective, cloud-like structure full of curves and mirrors. The pavilion, made of 13 layers of translucent polycarbonate panels, sits on a semi-circular shallow pool, carefully and delicately suspended just above the river. 

Inspiration came from chocolate – one of their client’s key products. ‘One of the key charms of traditional Chinese culture is that everyday places can be elevated into sacred spaces through the construction of shared memories,' says Wutopia Lab's lead architect Yu Ting. ‘That's when the chocolate came to my mind. Milk chocolate, reinvented by Shanghai's food industry (including the predecessor of Bright Food Group) during a time of material scarcity, was a boon to the Chinese people of that period and was once an integral part of Shanghai's culinary memory.

‘I decided to use milk chocolate as the theme of the pump room to awaken memories of ordinary people who were temporarily forgotten,’ he continues, ‘thus turning an abandoned facility into a sacred space for ordinary people – Shrine of Everyman.’

Reflecting this thinking in the small, 35 sq m structure, the architects created the shallow pool in a deep brown colour, while the structure above it is white – symbolising, respectively, chocolate and milk. Stepping inside, the visitor is drawn into a dream-like landscape, where they can explore, rest, or take in the views of the natural setting and Shanghai cityscape beyond.

INFORMATION

wutopialab.com

‘We wanted to create a retail experience which transported people forwards into time, where reality and science collide,’ says Sherry Huang, owner of experiential Shanghai-based luxury boutique ENG, which has opened its second outpost in Shanghai's TX Mall, a sprawling six-floor space that has the technologically savvy, experientially inclined Gen Z shopper in mind. ‘This gave birth to a strong sci-fi vision, referencing influences including Zaha Hadid for curves and shapes, Oscar Niemeyer for furniture installations, and also iconic science fiction classics like Gattaca, Minority Report and Westworld.’

‘We kept coming back to the “all-round” aspect of interiors in this sci-fi concept, a world where every surface in all dimensions is utilised in the absence of gravity drawing everything to the ground,’ adds Huang of ENG's second multi-brand concept store, a space that houses labels including Ottolinger, Martine Rose, Helmut Lang and Telfar. Its futuristic folds and metallic fixtures and fittings are interspersed with robotic arms, cyborg-like mannequins and geometric strips of lighting. Since ENG's inception in 2019, the boutique has focused on immersive retail, bridging cultural gaps between fashion, art and music, and stimulating the senses with holographic projections, vending machines and installations. It is also expanding the online domestic retail operations it runs through WeChat, and launching a global e-commerce platform.

Enter the futuristic world of ENG Shanghai

Shanghai’s TX Mall and its ENG outpost aim to bridge the gap between bricks-and-mortar and digital retail experiences. ‘Generally speaking, the young generation is more concerned with the cultural interpretation behind the clothes instead of the clothes themselves,’ Huang says, emphasising her decision to locate the new store within a leisure- and entertaintment-focused mall environment, and to dedicate 50 per cent of its floor space to ‘creative endeavours' that are not fashion focused. This is a consumer trend in luxury that we see not only in China but echoed around the world’s international markets, she adds.

One result of such a trend is ENG's collaboration with Valencia-born artist Carlos Saez, whose work has been exhibited at MoMA and The Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), The National Portrait Gallery (London) and La Termica, Las Naves and Espai Tactel (Spain). The collaboration comprises a series of art pieces resembling robotic arachnids, which will be exhibited at the new ENG until September 2021. ‘Saez’s work uniquely explores the relationships between the human and technology. We were immediately drawn to the synergy between this and our own vision and philosophy around this topic, and the common ground in bringing to fore the aesthetic of machinery and mechanisation,’ Huang says. 

‘By building all-round fashion content in three-dimensions, the space encourages our customers to change their perspective and see things differently,' she adds. ‘This physically embodies what is at the heart of ENG.’

INFORMATION

523 Huaihai Zhong Lu 
near Yandang Lu
Huangpu District

The 13th Shanghai Biennale has unveiled its ultimate exhibition, ‘Bodies of Water’, featuring 64 participating artists and 33 new commissions.

The biennial kicked off in November 2020 with ‘Phase 01: *A* Wet-run Rehearsal’, a five-day inaugural programme, followed by ‘Phase 02: An Ecosystem Of Alliances’, five months of activity and programming. This staggered approach enabled artists, thinkers and curators involved in the biennal to develop their work in close collaboration with the City of Shanghai, its people, networks of activism, organisations, and institutions.

Launched in 1996 as the first international biennial of contemporary art in mainland China, the event sets Shanghai as its primary locus, while positioning itself as a hub for global contemporary art exchange. 

The 13th edition is seeking to shake up the traditional biennial format and explore the participant-public divide. Unravelling over nine months, the ‘in crescendo' event reaches a climax with ‘Bodies of Water’, an exhibition dissecting how climates, ecosystems, technologies, and life in all its forms are inextricably interconnected.

In line with the biennial’s ethos, ‘Bodies of Water’ will be in dialogue with the history, geography and vernacular of Shanghai. Unfolding across other locations in the city, including the historic Sunke Villa, the event will begin at the Power Station of Art (PSA), China’s first state-run contemporary art museum and a venue with an intriguing past life as a former coal-electric plant that fuelled the industrialisation of the Huangpu River. 

In harmony with the themes of Earth Day (22 April 2021), participating artists and collectives present artworks that negotiate our entanglement in extended ecosystems of interdependency. A significant number of these works, 33 in total, have been commissioned and conceived for the space. Featured artists include Joan Jonas, Pan Daijing, Diakron and Emil Rønn Andersen, Torkwase Dyson, Tabita Rézaire, Jenna Sutela, Carlos Irijalba and Cecilia Vicuña. 

‘The 13th Shanghai Biennale advocates for the momentous contribution that art plays in the reconstruction of a world shaped by environmental, social and political distress. The Biennale is sensitive to the way art constitutes and infiltrates life itself, and to its capacities for bodied reparation, transformation and dissidence,’ says chief curator Andrés Jaque. 

‘Bodies of Water’ urges viewers to examine living collectivity at a time when the Earth is facing unprecedented challenges, from the swelling climate crisis to the ongoing global pandemic.

INFORMATION

'Bodies of Water', the 13th Shanghai Biennale's main exhibition, until 25 July 2021, at Power Station of Art (PSA)

shanghaibiennale.org

ADDRESS

200 Hua Yuan Gang Lu, Huangpu Qu
Shanghai, 200231

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In the suburbs of Shanghai, in Chonggu Town, a new museum celebrates the birthplace of Shanghai's ancient culture and the history of the Fuquan Mountain culture. Working within the remains of historic architecture, Shenzhen based architecture studio Horizontal Design carefully balanced renovation with new building design to create a voluminous collection of concrete forms that organically grows from the existing historic architecture.

Recently, efforts have been made to restore and revive the Zhang Yan Village, which dates back to the Tang and Song dynasties and appears in Chinese literature and cultural history. Across the village, new design projects are taking place to embrace its past, while updating it for contemporary uses too, so old and new can co-exist.

To start their design process for the museum, the architects researched and analysed the existing site. Several structures – the Village History Hall and the dilapidated Zhang Family’s House – formed the starting point for the new design, and closely neighbouring buildings such as a local temple, defined the spatial and aesthetic qualities of the design too.

On the site was a former family home dating back to the Qing dynasty. While it was in a state of disrepair, the architects chose to preserve what was left, and built a respectful addition to create one of the exhibition halls on the same footprint. The new architecture was slightly offset, so it appears to float within the ruin. The design follows the traditional atrium typology with inward sloping roofs, echoing the life of the former structure.

The better preserved Village History Hall was given a full renovation – the wooden load-bearing structure was repaired and revealed and partition walls were removed, so the original atrium space can again be celebrated. An anodized aluminium flooring, chosen to resist humidity, was laid throughout the exhibition halls, so there is consistency throughout the museum.

Further research revealed another historic building to the north, so a third exhibition hall was built on this footprint. Anodized aluminium was used for the flooring and ceiling, so this space feels more contemporary than the first two spaces.

Between the new volumes, bamboo plants and a water feature create a calming oasis for the community to enjoy. A grey brick masonry wall encloses the space forming a sheltered courtyard.

Rooi Design and Research studio has been busy thinking about how much waste is generated from temporary exhibition spaces. When planning for the Shanghai Furniture Fair last year, they took a considered approach for the design of display Furniture Pavilion S – a plywood structure that has now been given a new lease of life.

Founded Cape Town in 2018, with offices in Beijing and Shenzhen, Rooi took its ethos of creating ‘better and more “human-scale” environments for users’ when creating the angular and geometrical exhibition space for Side Furniture, a brand founded by Xin Huachen in 2018.

Keeping costs at a minimum was key, and so using plywood made sense for the modular structure, which consisted of 821 pieces of market standard size. Quick to assemble and dissemble, the edifice only used steel for the rest of the body and its roof, allowing the eco-conscious model to be seamless in its look and flooded with light in each display cove.

Today, Furniture Pavilion S has been made a comeback as 410 sets of hexagonal tables and rectangle chairs. Rooi was keen to ‘design the furniture which can be combined into different forms to increase the interactivity and fun, at the same time enrich the community activities.’ Installed at Comprehensive Cultural Service Center in a small town in Fuqing, Fujian Province, China, the furniture has a playful set up that can be added to, and pieced together for communal use.

‘We believe a design concept cannot be separated from its original context,’ says Rooi's biography, a sentiment that drives Furniture Pavilion S as a project that's sustainably and thoughtfully made for past, present and future shared experiences.

INFORMATION

rooidesign.com

By any yardstick, brand visibility is the touchstone of every sensible marketing strategy – even more so during these virus-laced days which have resulted in plunging global retail revenues.

Bottega Veneta, however, has long taken a contrarian approach, eschewing both flash and even a quotidian logo in favour of an understated almost opaque mood. And if its current pop-up installation slash boutique in Shanghai is anything to go by, the leather specialist is determined to literally amp up that opacity.

Conceived specifically for Plaza 66 under the watchful eye of Bottega Veneta’s laureled creative director, Daniel Lee, the three metre high, 100 sq m cuboid is clad entirely in mirrors, its sheer surface effectively camouflaged by the seamless reflection of the atrium’s panoramic landscape of tent-pole luxury-brand tenants.

Where other brands fight for space and visibility, Bottega Veneta gives them the opportunity, with the Invisible Store, to reflect their logos on the pop-up, an arch self-aware meta gesture. This pop-up subverts the idea of perception, the tension between the seen and unseen and gives visibilty a new spin.

The tension is particularly evident inside the pop-up where the volume of white-on-white surfaces and mirrors, toying with light and space in a journey of optical illusion, dizzyingly displays choice pieces from Bottega’s pre-Fall 2020 men’s and women’s collections of bags, small leather goods, shoes, jewellery, eyewear and prêt-à-porter.

INFORMATION

Until 19 July 2020. bottegaveneta.com

ADDRESS

Plaza 66
1266 Nanjing West Road
Jing An District
Shanghai, China

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After five years of renovations to a 100-year-old, heritage-listed mansion, Chinese lifestyle brand Beast and Danish design company Gubi have unveiled a boutique hotel and café on a quiet street in Shanghai’s former French Concession.

Designed by the two teams and local studio Chaos Programme, Beast x Gubi House’s interior reflects the buzzing city’s distinct blend of modern and historic – terrazzo, green marble accents and a muted palette of pale pink, cream and grey juxtaposed against the historic building’s original window fittings and roughly hewn wooden ceiling beams.

All in all it’s an artful setting to showcase Gubi’s elegant furniture and lighting pieces, which outfit the sleek, three-storey property’s two guestrooms, penthouse event space and ground-floor café. Contemporary artworks curated from Beast’s own collection add to the intimate, residential ambiance, as do views of the charming private garden, which you can leisurely take in at the café from the comfort of a Gubi Beetle Chair.

INFORMATION

beastgubihouse@thebeastshop.com

ADDRESS

15 Tao Jiang Road
Xuhui District

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MINI would like to be perceived as a urban lifestyle brand. The marque is undergoing self-analysis to evaluate its place beyond car making — to see where this archetype city commuter fits in within the age of clean, driverless, shared transport.



One strand of this puzzle is MINI Living, an initiative involved in creating alternative living and working spaces that are designed to enrich urban life. The handful of projects commissioned since 2016 have been purely conceptual — offering utopian visions and alternative habitats in London, Milan, Los Angeles and Beijing. Now, elements from these studies are informing a functioning live/work/play building that will open in Shanghai in April 2020.



The 7,600 sq m space occupies a former paint factory in the city’s central Jing'an district. The five buildings will offer a mix of private, communal and public areas, with 45 apartments on-site, a shared lobby and co-working space, shops and temporary pop-up stores, market stalls and a restaurant. There's also a rooftop gym and urban farm, a MINI car-sharing scheme, and a cultural centre open to the public. 



Working with architect Satoshi Isono from the London-based Universal Design Studio, the team are using the existing factory as their base, opening up the ground floor and connecting the five buildings via bridges and thoroughfares. Central to the design is the open shelf structure, ‘the window’ at entrance facing the city and theoretically inviting Shanghai residents in. Generously carved out from the structure, the frame will be an adaptable space curated by the Brooklyn-based and MINI-backed A/D/O to host cultural projects.

To understand the scheme, Wallpaper* met with architect Oke Hauser, creative lead at MINI Living...

Wallpaper*: The Shanghai project is still a construction site, so why invite the public to see the incomplete building?

Oke Hauser: It is important for us to showcase this to the outside world to see your reactions and get your inputs. This is essential to our project. What we are doing here is not static – it is in constant progress, and it is a public project to be informed by others. 



W*: The seven MINI Living concepts so far have responded to a whole range of city life concerns. How much have they informed this project?

OH: Elements from each of the concept designs has influenced our work here, not always directly but conceptually. For instance, at Milan Salone del Mobile we showed a concept that blurred the line between public and private space. Here, central to our design are the rotating walls that open a private area into a public space, then onto the city and the outside world. 



W*: You have said that the MINI Living projects will respond to place - to local architecture, culture and needs. The three Urban Cabin concepts in London, LA and Beijing were specifically about introducing local character and stimulating a dialogue with the past and present. Here too you are working with the Jing’an industrial site as well as traditional Chinese window design as a way of offering an overlay of symbolism. Can you explain the design?

OH: We are working with Universal Design Studio and theirs is a very human-centric approach. The design here is informed by the industrial background of this neighbourhood and the paint factory which was formally here on-site. And yes, our projects are and will be glocal; we are responding to our immediate environments. The Urban Cabin concepts were authentic to their place, and we aim to continue to connect with the cities we build in. 

W*: The Shanghai project feels like a continuation of some of the utopian visions of the early last century, which are possibly even more relevant today.

OH: Absolutely. Cities today are becoming larger and more disconnected, and they can feel lonely; people are isolated and there is this element of social silence. We think that design can tackle this. Therefore, this project is about inviting the city into the private space - to be involved. The rotating walls encourage openness with residents and non-residents, as does the cultural centre.



W*: A/D/O MINI will be involved in running the cultural events in the public gallery here. How else do you propose to involve the larger Shanghai creative community?

OH: We have been scanning the city to find businesses who share our values and ones that we can collaborate with. We are working with a dynamic group of local creative industries in the arts, design, fashion, media who will be also be represented on-site. 



W*: Why choose this city to make your first public MINI Living statement?

OH: In Shanghai you really see urbanisation happening; there is such intense development here with rising property prices and great pressure on residents. So, it feels like the right place to discuss alternatives of how to live. This particular Jing’an district is open to new ideas. Also, interestingly China is up for experimenting and testing things out. There is a strong idea to bring back this sense of community, and our project is supported by the local government.



W*: Who do you see occupying the MINI Living spaces, starting with this Shanghai project?

OH: People who believe that if you open yourself to others and the community, you gain from it. It isn’t an age group but a mindset. And we’re aiming for a diverse community, an international community to include locals but also ex-pats. We want people coming to work in Shanghai to arrive here, see the real city as opposed to the high-rises of Pudong where they would normally land. Ultimately, we would like their mindset to shift a little. Sharing a space benefits everyone and offers the smarter way to live in cities. This is an open project and needs to stay alive.



W*: How does it fit into MINI the car company? At the moment the two sides seem to operate quite separately.

OH: The MINI Living scheme is integrated into the whole concept of the company becoming an electric lifestyle brand to include the electric car and shared car ownership schemes. But yes, absolutely we will work more closely in the future. MINI Living is opening the possibilities for what MINI can ultimately be. It is a holistic approach.

INFORMATION

mini.com

universaldesignstudio.com

a-d-o.com

It’s very unlikely that anyone will ever knock the Bund off Shanghai’s list of head-turning destinations, but that hasn’t stopped the city’s entrepreneurial developers from trying.

For now, at least, pundits remain optimistic about the potential of the old Shiliupu Dock, in particular a former grease factory set prettily on the Huangpu River, its vast complex rehabilitated into a mod mix of restaurants, clubs and cafés.

Here, Hong Kong-based o&o studio have unified three ground floor units into a mood-lit watering hole specialising in handcrafted beer and whiskey. The motif of a full moon floating over the river runs subtly through the décor of circular bar shelves, mirrored discs, and clouds of glass hanging off the ceiling.

The robot cocktail maker is entertaining in a, well, robotic way, but greater pleasures are to be found sampling the locally brewed pale ales and tucking into chef Liang Shang Yun’s fusion Asian menu such as beef stewed with fermented red beancurd, and lamb meat balls hit with Xinjiang spices.

ADDRESS

Unit 101-103 Cool Docks
No.505 Zhongshan South Road
Shanghai

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Designed by David Chipperfield Architects, Shanghai’s West Bund Museum, which houses the Pompidou Centre’s first overseas branch, is part of the city’s master plan to see a nearly-nine-square-kilometre piece of industrial land transformed into one of Asia’s prime cultural districts by the end of next year. It is also the practice’s seventh completed project in China since it opened a representative office in the city in 2005.

Situated on the Shanghai Corniche, which enjoys an uninterrupted shoreline of nearly 11.5km, the new West Bund district will see 20 cultural and art institutions along the stretch. Among them are Sou Fujimoto’s Yuz Museum, Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee’s Shanghai Center of Photography, the Long Museum by local firm Atelier Deshaus and Tank Shanghai by Open Architecture. The West Bund Museum, the latest-comer, sits on a triangular plot on the northern edge of a new public park where Longteng Avenue and the Huangpu River converge.

The architects were given a fairly generic brief for the museum when the project was commissioned in 2013, and the idea of the three independent yet interlocking volumes came from the possibility that there would be multiple users for its 22,000sqm of exhibition and event spaces. The Centre Pompidou x West Bund Museum Project, as it is known, is part of a Sino-French cultural collaboration to import curated exhibitions from the French institution to the museum for the next five years, although the ambitious scheme was confirmed only when the building was almost built. Alexander Schwarz, design lead of the project recalls: ‘Pompidou could have lived with some other arrangement. When they came in, we did some reinterpretation of what was already built.’

Traditionally, a museum is built because there is a collection to house. ‘It's quite easy to build a good museum around a good collection. You just make sure the artworks look good and you create the optimum encounter between the visitors and the art,’ he says. ‘The West Bund Museum was the opposite – the content came afterwards. It's almost as though you abstract architectural scenes and develop them in a way that could work for other uses as well. But in the end, it's all about good spaces and good light.’

The three volumes set around a central lobby with a double-height atrium – each 17m high and sited over two storeys – are covered in opalescent recycled glass. The upper levels are given to gallery space while the lower levels are multifunctional and include art studios, education spaces, a bookshop and a café. The atrium roof cantilevers beyond the building towards the river and road; it also features a huge, supporting column that draws the eye to the entrances.

Schwarz says: ‘There is another aspect to this building, which is its publicness. The foyer spaces are highly accessible and their views to the city are something that won’t change. And I think the architecture can rely on this. And whatever people do here, or the content they create, will be put in the context of this extraordinary setting.’

The unique economic and social environment in China certainly inspires new ways of thinking and designing. ‘When the museum was being built, it was expected all to be clad. But this experience with refitting the building has allowed us to experiment on the possibilities of the concrete structure with daylight. Everything in China happens quite organically and it’s almost like dealing with nature. You need to find alternative strategies in order to work there,’ he says.

INFORMATION

davidchipperfield.com

Already established in mainland Taiwan, the KiKi Restaurant Group made its first foray onto mainland China this summer with the launch of Kiki Noodle House in Shanghai.

This newest addition to the family might also be its most stylish outfit, with design by the Beijing-based Golucci Interior Architects, who has led with the spatial logic of traditional Taiwanese architecture reinvented through a contemporary lens.

The result sees a compelling juxtaposition of old and new concepts; a space where an old Taiwanese street cooking cart welcomes diners into a room characterised by a neutral palette of greys and beige, clean lines and an abundance of oak and concrete.

The influence of Taiwanese residential design is also evident in the ceiling, which mirrors the eaves and patios of classic buildings, and the outdoor ‘courtyard’ layout of the restaurant itself. A curvilinear wall bearing a forest mural introduces serenity via nature matched by the rock-like formations and topiary that sit in the centre of tables, and interrupted only by the reassuringly loud slurps of patrons dining on traditional dan dan noodles.

INFORMATION

Website

ADDRESS

Unit SL3-04C
3/F, South Tower, Hong Kong Plaza
No.283 Huai Hai Road
Shanghai

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With his spiky UK pavilion for Shanghai’s 2010 World Expo, Thomas Heatherwick became one of the most sought-after designers in Asia. Mr He-si-wei-ke, as he is known, remains one of only a handful of recognised Western names in China, and his latest project, a spectacular new complex in Shanghai’s Moganshan district, is sure to seal his status as one of the UK’s most innovative architectural ambassadors.

The first phase of this mixed-use development for the Tian An China Investments Company is due for completion in May 2020. Set on a former industrial area in a bend of Suzhou Creek, with the low-level warehouse and factory conversions of the trendy M50 arts district to the south, the site is also home to that rare commodity in Shanghai: a woodland park.

It would have been a relatively simple matter to cram the project’s required 300,000 sq m floor area into a conventional tower. But Heatherwick’s desire to avoid a high-rise development looming over the M50’s converted warehouses demanded more imaginative thinking. The result is a tree-lined ‘mountain’ that wraps itself in the landscape and lifts trees to every level of the building. As Heatherwick describes it, this unique topography ‘knits the new with the old’.

Hundreds of concrete columns were used to distribute the weight of the trees to the ground. Widening at the top to form a huge planter containing one tree and a variety of hanging plants, each of the columns features horizontal ribbing that helps break up its height from a distance; up close, the structures resemble handcrafted pottery. Each column looks as if it is free-floating, but is actually tied back to support the floors and to provide seismic stability. This structural grid creates a stack of boxes that are staggered at each storey height to form multilayered terraces, indoor spaces and sky gardens with the planters rising just above head height to give the illusion of trees floating in mid-air.

Research on the column designs has taken two years; growing and selecting the correct locally sourced tree species (chosen for their hardiness at varying altitudes and wind speeds, but also for their colour variation) has taken even longer. With 60 per cent evergreen species, the mountain will always be lush and verdant, although natural seasonal variation will be reflected in the shape and form of deciduous varieties.

On the riverside elevation, the treescape spreads out at ground level to form a new public park and riverside walkway. On the south side, however, the idea was to cut away the monumental form as if slicing through the hillside, exposing an architectural section of the building. Billboard-size advertising opportunities have been formed in the exposed structural grid, interspersed with original paintings and graffiti art inspired by, and typically carried out by, the M50 creatives. The art continues in the cavernous interior of the building, with local and internationally renowned graffiti artists’ work on display.

A gamechanger for the designer, this project also demonstrates the importance of an enlightened client with a long-term commitment to architecture. The project’s second phase (including a 100m-tall tower) is not due to be completed before 2024, but 1000 Trees has already changed the urban landscape forever. 

As originally featured in the November 2019 issue of Wallpaper* (W*248) – on newsstands now

INFORMATION

heatherwick.com

Emerging Chinese architecture firm ArchUnits has unveiled its solution for the complete remodelling of an existing building in Shanghai into a flowing, contemporary workspace, for the company MORE Huashan. The design, which is located a stone's throw from the city's iconic Jing'an Temple, enhances the structure’s connection to its surroundings through a reworked volume and strategically placed openings.

Transforming the original building with its cramped cubicles and segregated office areas into a modern, open plan interior fit for communication and sharing was no mean feat; and the project also comes with a striking façade to boot, making this piece of office architecture a new landmark for the area.

While the existing building was not a listed monument itself, it sits in the historical Shanghai French Concession district, so strict guidelines in terms of the new design’s height, massing and appearance from the street had to be observed. The architects’ response was to take their cues from the original structure – and in particular a large wall surface, the building's tallest point, which they maintained and used as virtual shorthand for the whole project. Now wrapped in swooping curves and crisp white walls, the building makes for a striking, yet friendly street presence.

A sculptural staircase in the main entrance atrium spans all levels and announces itself from the street side through large glass expanses. At the same time, it helps with air and light circulation inside, through its openness; while adding a level of transparency and an element of orientation for the users, being part-art piece, part-wayfinding tool.

INFORMATION

archunits.com

China is now the world’s second biggest art market, having overtaken the UK, according to a recently published report commissioned by Art Basel and UBS. The US remains the largest, with 42 per cent of the market, while China enjoys a 21 per cent share, a significant increase on the nine per cent it had in 2008. On the one hand, Shanghai’s rapidly evolving art scene is attracting huge interest globally; on the other, Beijing has long been the heart of Chinese culture and a beacon of contemporary Chinese art.

Kylie Ying, co-founder of two of the country’s headline art fairs – Jingart in Beijing and ART021 in Shanghai – opines the capital is only gaining cultural cachet. ‘Most of the local galleries were founded and established in Beijing. Many Chinese artists are based in the capital, and the city is very strong both in ancient and contemporary art,’ she says. ‘A city with such a profound cultural heritage should have a high-level art fair.’

Jingart (30 May – 2 June) wrapped up its second edition earlier this month in Beijing, having brought together 41 leading international and Chinese galleries at the historic Sino-Soviet style Beijing Exhibition Center, with a genre-spanning showcase of art and design, furniture, fine jewellery and decorative arts. Jingart co-founder Bao Yifeng notes that galleries are tapping into China’s flourishing art market, opening new premises across the country with artists from both home and abroad represented, but ‘gallerists are particularly curious about the Beijing market and want to try this old-new capital’.

Local galleries staged some of their best exhibitions of the year to coincide with the fair: Beijing Commune hosted a solo presentation at Jingart for the Beijing-born Ma Qiusha, who investigates feminism in her work and is one of the nominees for the Porsche ‘Young Chinese Artist of the Year’ award. At its space in the city’s 798 Art Zone, Zhou Yilun from Hangzhou had his second exhibition with the gallery, titled ‘Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again’, which reworks commercial items to find new life in ‘the superfluous’.

‘Beijing is the heart of the local art scene while Shanghai is developing into a new international hub for contemporary art, which is also highly market-oriented’, says gallery director Lu Jingjing. Mengmeng Li, of HdM Gallery adds: ‘Shanghai is showing rapid transition from a collectors’ market to a consumers’ market and people are more open to young artists and more fashionable expressions. Beijing leans towards works that are bigger and weightier – works that shows traditional values and with precise context, purpose and meaning.’

‘The Window Blind’ was Shanghai-born Hu Weiyi’s first collaboration with the HdM and his second solo exhibition in the city after his show at Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA). Hu delves into the complicated relationship between the natural and manufactured world through photography, videography and installations. At Hive Center for Contemporary Art was Shanghainese LI Wenguang‘s ‘Science Fiction’, whose practice focuses on pseudoscience and the subconscious. Curatorial director Jian Yang believes that the differences in culture and mentality between Beijing and Shanghai are ‘essential and healthy’ for China’s future artistic development. 

Beijing is also the country’s major auction centres, and where investment is rocketing. Auction house China Guardian holds fifth place in worldwide rankings  with sales of $873 million – 84 per cent of which stemmed from the capital. Strategically positioned at the edge of the Forbidden City, and designed by Ole Scheeren, the Guardian Art Center is seen as a contemporary response to China’s cultural history. With its striking architecture, healthy arts programme and lifestyle outlets, it has been in the spotlight since its opening in early 2018.

The greatest players in the global art world are drawn to Beijing by its frequent collaborations with prestigious institutions. UCCA, which has been fronting the China-international modern art dialogue since 2007, has just opened the first exhibition of Picasso in the country in collaboration with Musée National Picasso-Paris. In 2017, the centre underwent a renovation masterminded by Dutch architects OMA.

M Woods, one of the youngest private museums in China, established in 2014 within a repurposed former munitions factory, will present a David Hockney exhibition this year in partnership with the Tate, and has also just announced an imminent venue in the Longfusi area – the historical and cultural nucleus of the capital – with an ambition to form a new cultural hub in the old city together with the Forbidden City, the National Art Museum of China and the People’s Art Theater. ‘Together, the two venues with their different specialities and features will further enrich the Beijing art scene, which is what the city needs urgently,’ says M Woods co-founder Michael Xufu Huang.

The world’s biggest vehicle market is fast becoming the most influential too. At China’s most important motor show for 2019 – Auto Shanghai (18-25 April)  – electric car unveilings were the rule, not the exception. The only significant global premiere that Wallpaper* noted without an electric powertrain was Mercedes GLB small SUV – and even that model will spawn an electric variant soon.

The reason? While the western world slowly moves towards electric vehicles – accelerated by the ripples from VW’s ‘Dieselgate’ emissions scandal – the Chinese Government is promoting electric vehicles as never before. This is in large part to alleviate the vast country’s urban traffic and pollution problems but also because, as one non-Chinese designer working for a local Chinese maker put it: ‘the Chinese Government wants its auto industry to take over the world via electrification’.

Despite a slight sales decline in 2018, down 4 per cent to 23.8m units, the Chinese market is still massive and firmly number one – the US shifted 17.3m and Europe 15.6m by comparison. Chinese designers at local car brands – albeit often under the guidance of older Western design chiefs – are now showing more maturity in exterior execution and creating interiors bristling with innovation. Meanwhile, many historic western brands are being revitalised under new Chinese backing (Volvo and more recently Lotus are two examples, both now majority-owned by Geely Holdings).

All in all, China has become a key market, investor and player in the auto world. Out of the myriad global unveils across a dozen-plus halls over multiple floors, here are Wallpaper’s 2019 Auto Shanghai favourites…

Geometry A

Chinese brands unknown or at least new to most western eyes were in abundance at the 2019 Shanghai show. In contrast to the various mystery start-up concepts with only projected on-sale production dates, the model A from all-new, all-electric Geometry brand of parent company Geely Auto, was one of the most convincing unveils. Why? Because a) the compact saloon is already on sale in China, for RMB150,000 (about £17,000), due for distribution worldwide and offering two credible electric-range options – 410km and 500km and b) the well-designed vehicle has a remarkably sophisticated interior with details like embedded under-the-surface buttons that not even high-end Western makers have yet managed to get into production.

Lotus Type 130

Historically much-loved but currently under-performing sports car brand Lotus chose Shanghai to announce its effective re-birth with backing from Chinese owner Geely Auto. The first product in the new range will be a £1.5m-plus full-electric two-seater hypercar called Type 130. Development is well under way – we've seen exclusive full-scale model evidence – but publicly for now Lotus only showed an enigmatic silhouette render. Expect Le Mans prototype-style aero tricks and serious power and performance from the final model to be revealed later this year in London, and more sporting models from Lotus to come swiftly after. Promising.

BYD E-Seed GT

Build Your Dreams (BYD) is a Chinese supplier of electric buses to London – routes 153, 360, 507 and 521 in case you were wondering. It’s also a major manufacturer of batteries and trains and boasts being the best-selling electric car maker in the world. So far so functional, but at Shanghai BYD broke free from its practical self to unveil a gull-wing doored E-Seed GT concept created by a supergroup of western designers led by ex-Audi design boss Wolfgang Egger and ably assisted by ex-Mercedes interiors man Michele Jauch-Paganetti and ex-Ferrari exterior expert JuanMa Lopez. More about styling direction than tomorrow’s production reality and far removed from BYD’s regular electric SUVs and saloons, the E-Seed GT nonetheless shows BYD’s ambition to build some more dreams, and knowing its track record, sooner than you think.

Karma GT by Pininfarina

Another western brand resurrected by Chinese backing – even if far less established than Lotus – is the nascent US EV brand Karma. The brand’s first Revero four-door model has been on sale for a few years now and sold a few hundred in the US, but Shanghai saw the reveal of a revised version plus the far more striking two-door coupe GT alongside it. Created by legendary Italian design house Pininfarina behind almost all the great Ferraris of the late 20th-century, it presented a highly elegant future design direction for the upmarket EV Tesla rival. If we were Karma, we’d take it.

Mercedes Concept GLB

Master niche-filler Mercedes, unveiled another SUV – the small but upright seven-seat Concept GLB which will make production barely changed later this year – after chatting to Chinese customers and realising they’d missed a trick. ‘The design is a mix of G-Wagen and GLS and came as a direct result of customer feedback from China,’ Mercedes’ head of exterior design Robert Lesnik explains. ‘Not every market wants a third row, but China was keen and it will be sold worldwide, with the third row optional in European markets.’ Unlike almost every other car at the Shanghai show the GLB was shown with a 224hp four-cylinder petrol engine. But fear not EV fans, an electric version called EQB will follow in 2021.

Volkswagen ID.Roomzz concept

VW’s upcoming family of EVs are all prefaced by the ID moniker and its sixth – the ID.ROOMZZ – was revealed in Shanghai. Despite the German brand’s misplaced obsession with spelling most of its EVs with too many capital Zs – CROZZ, BUZZ and VIZZION are three others – the idea is still not sending us to sleep, as the concepts genuinely preview a change of course from the disgraced business famously caught fibbing about its diesel models’ emissions back in 2015. The ID.Roomzz – capitalisation now dropped for the sake of sanity – is VW’s seven-seat electric SUV and its clean aesthetic inside and out is firmly in line with the rest of the ID range which should lead to a more beautiful and cleaner landscape from 2021 onwards. China is a key part of that push too. VW has gone on record as saying its overall Group (including Audi, Skoda et al) aims to produce 22 million full-electric vehicles by 2028, of which it hopes 11.6 million will be sold in China. Serious and likely.

Aiways U7 ion

Yet another example of a Chinese start-up recruiting established talent from more mature automotive markets, Aiways – born in 2017 – recently hired independent designer Ken Okuyama and gave him the rather grand title of ‘chief advisor of design and art’. The Japanese veteran is best known for his work at Pininfarina, including the Ferrari Enzo, 612 Scaglietti and 599 GTB Fiorano as well as the Maserati Quattroporte. Okyama also has his own eyewear range and designs trains and bikes. In Shanghai, his first design for Aiways was the U7 ion concept, a spacious four-seater equipped with 12 high definition screens that aims to be a sanctuary for modern life. Somewhat unbelievably it boasts a self-learning robot, mounted to a roof rail inside the cabin that moves around the vehicle to offer on-board sound recognition, passenger identification and more. Okuyama is clearly convinced. ‘I chose to work for this company because they do technology in a way the Japanese and Koreans don’t,’ he explains candidly. One to watch.

Audi AI:ME

Audi’s design has been going through an awkward phase of late so it was refreshing to see and sit in the very well-resolved AI:ME megacity concept in Shanghai. Displaying bold ideas with a truly original interior it also gained bonus points for including, as far as we are aware, the first use of hanging plants in a concept car. Beyond that original aesthetic flourish, the AI:ME offers space for four people, Level 4 autonomous capability and high levels of artificial intelligence (thus the vehicle’s name). The idea behind the AI:ME is that it will learn users’ preferences over time, reacting to eye movement, voice, gesture and touch, to make each journey more tailored. So for instance, the lighting in the car only switches on when the driver approaches and the order in which the lights come on guide the user’s gaze towards the car’s various functions.

Dial in the use of material not normally associated with vehicle cabins, like Corian (which covers the door rails and touch pads), high-quality wooden struts (and those hanging plants) in the large panoramic roof area, electro-chromatically tint-able windows, and a sound system with noise cancelling to shut out traffic noise and city dwellers’ inward gaze when required, and the AI:ME creates quite a vision for shareable future city mobility. As Australian-born interior designer James Nissen explains: ‘Overall, our approach was to make the AI:ME less like a car, and more like a home.’ The best interior concept of the show by far.

INFORMATION
Auto Shanghai runs until 25 April. For more information, visit the Auto Shanghai website

ADDRESS

National Exhibition and Convention Center
333 Songze Avenue
Qingpu District
Shanghai

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‘If you understand Mademoiselle Privé, you understand the brand,’ Chanel’s president of fashion, Bruno Pavlovsky, explains two days before the globetrotting exhibition’s Shanghai opening. ‘The show is about energy. Chanel is about the creative energy we want to share with our audience.' Fitting for a city so explosively dynamic that it feels as though electricity is crackling through the air. Following its debut in 2015 in London, Mademoiselle Privé stopped over in Seoul (2017) and Hong Kong (2018) before its current six-week stint at Shanghai’s West Bund Art Center. For the latest show – named after the words written on Gabrielle ‘Coco' Chanel's studio door – the Parisian maison has tailored the exhibition to a massive 6,000 sq m of space.

On the ground floor, you can flip through a small library with volumes on Coco Chanel and late icon Karl Lagerfeld or watch Lagerfeld’s films and shorts about the house projected onto a large screen. Upstairs on the mezzanine level, the exhibition presents three houses, reached through individual staircases, spotlighting the house’s three creative pillars: haute couture, high jewellery and the iconic 1921-founded Chanel No 5 perfume.

Enter 31 rue Cambon – the Parisian address of the house’s haute couture ateliers since 1918 – and weave through seven collections, spanning S/S 2013 to A/W 2018/19, by Karl Lagerfeld. Classic silhouettes refashioned in innovative materials like neoprene and aluminium inhabit nooks within the cloudlike space that’s been draped in vast swathes of luxurious fabrics in white and cream. Listen closely: each season has been imagined as haute couture might be lived in modern life – three friends chattering away at a rock concert, a small group of seven gossiping on the tube after a night out.

Next door is the olafactory wonderland of Chanel No 5. A soft echo of Lagerfeld’s floral-splashed S/S 2015 show, beds of mint green, pale pink and pastel yellow coloured paper flowers sprout up from the ground. Each represent one of the 80 scents (jasmine, may rose, ylang-ylang) found in the legendary fragrance created in 1921 by Chanel and perfumer Ernest Beaux.

The crown jewel of the Shanghai show may just be 18 Place Vendôme, the house’s display of the birthplace of its high jewellery. Chinese artist Wu Guanzhen has reinterpreted Coco Chanel’s collection of antique Coromandel screens – the theme of its 2018 High Jewellery collection – into three exquisite artworks ‘Lofty Mountain', ‘Early Spring' and ‘Garden of Pleasure'.

‘My first consideration was the exhibition space and its atmosphere,’ explains Wu, who was inspired to work with lacquer first in 2011 by the childhood memory of leaves flickering in the sunlight and their texture. ‘It’s an environment which called for more delicate pieces.' Tactile and alive with texture like many pieces at 31 Rue Cambon, the diaphanous screens coated in lacquer complement the equally delicate-but-daring, glittering re-edition of Bijoux de Diamants, Gabrielle Chanel’s one and only jewellery collection designed in 1932.

In its Shanghai chapter, tech-forward Mademoiselle Privé, which had its own app for other cities, has embraced China’s digital eco-system with a mini programme in the country’s one-size-fits-all social media/messaging/payment platform WeChat. Through WeChat, visitors can book and discover more about Mademoiselle Privé and its programming of half-hour workshops – like embroidery, gold leaf application and baudruchage (the art of sealing perfume bottles) – and once onsite, scan QR codes to delve further into the Chanel story through multimedia content.

‘The best colour in the whole world is the colour that looks good on you,' Coco Chanel once said, and Mademoiselle Privé looks pretty good in the shade of Shanghai.

INFORMATION

Mademoiselle Privé is on view from 20 April to 2 June 2019. For more information, visit the Chanel website, West Bund Art Centre website

ADDRESS

2555 Longteng Ave
Xuhui Qu
Shanghai Shi
China

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The point where old and new meet is often the space where some of the most interesting architectural experiments take place; and Shanghai's brand new Tank Art Park is a case in point. The city's latest cultural space is the brainchild of Beijing based studio Open Architecture and opened its doors to the public this weekend. 

Occupying five abandoned aviation fuel tanks and further facilities that once belonged to Longhua Airport, the site is an expansive 47,448 sq m situated on the West Bund district, by the river. The tanks and their surroundings have now been transformed into an integrated cultural space that brings together art, leisure and nature – something of a specialty for Open Architecture. The studio is experienced in innovative art spaces that offer eye-catching design but also blend with their context – their latest works include projects, such as the UCCA Dune Art Museum.

The five tanks serve a large variety of uses; there's dedicated space for live music performances in one, another hosts a restaurant, while the last three are designed to contain exhibition spaces. A large open air park unites everything, creating valuable green space for the city on the banks of the Huangpu River as well as connections between the different areas. Further flexible indoor exhibition and service spaces can be found below ground level, subtly interconnecting the tanks.

The architects were keen to maintain the site's distinctive character, so, many of the original industrial features were preserved. ‘[The project transforms] containers of fuel into containers of culture, while paying tribute to the site’s industrial past', they say. 

INFORMATION

For more information visit the website of Open Architecture

Last year, we introduced nine burgeoning Chinese designers and brands, including Furong Chen, Ximi Li, Zhoujie Zhang, that we discovered at Design Shanghai, China’s most sought-after design fair. During this year’s edition (6-9 March), we uncovered six more emerging names to look out for.

Between them, they are evolving the Chinese design landscape in a number of crucial ways: by addressing sustainability through exploring new materials; up-cycling and slow manufacturing; using technology to enhance everyday experiences; adapting and transforming traditional craftsmanship to contemporary life; and revolutionising Chinese manufacturing...

Defront

Defront was set up in 2014 by two UK-based Chinese designers Jingzi Pan and Danyang Fu, who had worked for major companies including Bentley and Johnson & Johnson, and both attended Microsoft Cambridge research centre. The brand collaborates with designers, inventors, technologists and social workers across eastern and western cultures. Three years ago, Defront started a Kickstarter campaign for one of its first landmark designs, the ‘Hei’ Teaset, designed to revive China's tea ceremony tradition. Following that is ‘Lumia’ (pictured), an adjustable table lamp with a clever brightness function that creates a balance between tactile and intuitive experiences. This year, it launched a scent diffuser called ‘Triple-X’; the design allows users to control the density of essential oil that evaporates into the air by altering the speed of the fan.

Mumoon

Founded in the Guangdong province in 2010, Mumoon is a brand built on more than 20 years of production and manufacturing. The collection started with designers from abroad but this year it turned to its homeland launching its first collection with Hangzhou-based Mario Tsai. The locally educated designer started his studio in 2014 and since then has worked with Chinese brands like Shang Xia, ZaoZuo and international firms including Ferm Living and Woud.

The lighting fixture series ‘HOLD’ (pictured) comprises four ready-made components that can be multiplied and composited indefinitely into ambient chandeliers, floor lamps, table lamps or wall lamps. This also solves the comprehensive problems of packaging and transportation, thus making it a greener product. The collection will also be part of the designer’s solo exhibition in April at this year's Milan Design Week.

Nanchow

Xiamen-based Nanchow was founded in 2012 and relies on traditional methods in its entire production process. The special patterns and colours of the tiles are all handmade with cement, sands and mineral pigment, providing a low-energy and environmentally-friendly product. The waste from the manufacturing process has been developed into the ‘Re-tile’ accessory collection, which includes paperweights, magnets and bookends (pictured). The brand also collaborates with artists and uses new materials and techniques to improve the quality and aesthetic value of this craftsmanship. At the fair they lanched ‘NA0010,’ a collaboration between Nanchow’s chief designer Lin Yuming and artist Jiang Cheng.

Qiu

Founded only last year by the Qiu twin brothers Simin and Sitao, Qiu Design is a multidisciplinary studio based in Shanghai. Graduating respectively as a product designer (Simin) from the Royal College of Art and a graphic designer (Sitao) from Central Saint Martins, between them they worked for international design firms like Samuel Wilkinson and Neri & Hu and served Chinese clients such as Huawei and Ant Financial before launching the studio together.

For their debut at Design Shanghai, they present the ‘Rattan’ collection (pictured) that is made traditionally: colours and patterns are added manually to the machine-waved octagonal cane webbing. The series of home furniture comprises a chair, stool, wall shelf, cabinet, desk and small accessories, and the design takes advantage of the flexibility and strength of the material itself so that it can be used structurally as well as decoratively. All prototypes are handcrafted in Foshan, where most of the rattan suppliers in China reside.

Tang Mode

Featured in last year’s picks from the fair, Tang Mode is the new concept developed by Tells Studio. Founders Xinyu Dang and Jie He continue their research in traditional crafts and local materials, and the balance between creativity and functionality. This time the subject turns to Yixing clay, a type of clay found near the city of Yixing in Jiangsu Province and used in pottery since the Song dynasty (960–1279). The finished stoneware has a purple-red-brown hue, and thus the material is also commonly known as purple clay. It is regarded as old-fashioned, but the studio aims to revive its beauty by creating contemporary items such as a water pitcher, container, oil pourer etc. At the same time, it hopes to show a young generation how the material improves as it ages, from its rough grainy texture when new to its gentle transformation into a smooth, shiny item – think of it as turning from stone to jade.

Buzao

Established in 2017 as a subsidiary of Bentu design studio, Buzao experiments with new materials through design and manufacturing processes. This year the brand launched two collections in the fair’s inaugural New Materials & Applications Design Hall. One of these is the ‘Hot’ collection (pictured) that takes advantage of the uneven distribution of positive and negative electrons in electroplated stainless steel to create random rainbow-hued patterns in a palette of psychedelic colours.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Design Shanghai website

One of the fastest-growing cities in China, Xiamen – equidistant from Shanghai and Hong Kong – is also emerging as one of the nation’s most sophisticated metropolises. From a flourishing art scene – the Jimei x Arles International Photo Festival is currently in its fourth year – to a new metro system and the world’s longest elevated cycling path, designed by Danish firm Dissing + Weitling, its urban cool, along with a relaxed coastal setting, colonial treasures and favourable climate have created a winning combination that has made it a must-visit destination.

Tucked away on the north-east coastline of the Xiamen Island, the PuShang Hotel and Spa follows the much-applauded PuLi Hotel in Shanghai, as the second property from local group Urban Resort Concepts. Australian firm Layan Design Group took its cues from Fujian Tulou, the traditional rural dwellings in the region, to create a series of buildings that are arranged around landscaped courtyards which, together, create a private sanctuary that brings the outside in.

The 188 rooms and suites, in particular, are spacious cocoons – each with their own balconies that look out onto the marina and the ocean beyond – that feature a quiet mood of local granite and rust stone, which are highlighted with paintings by acclaimed artist Lu Fu Sheng and ceramic detailing that reflects the clay screens used in traditional Chinese buildings. 
 
The in-house Chinese restaurant, XIA is characterised by miniature red bricks walls that are a nod to the old surrounding villages, while the Long Bar, which stretches 30-metres across the first floor reception, salon and tea library is the best vantage point from which to enjoy the hotel's low-key architecture while sipping on a post dinner tipple.

Due to open soon is the hotel's standout UR Spa, which will include a hydro circuit with numerous pool and water experiences as well as therapy rooms offering treatments that combine Chinese ancient healing methodology and modern science.§

INFORMATION

Website

ADDRESS

277 Penang Road
Huli District,
Xiamen
361015
China

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It’s not often that a hotel opens as ambitiously as the Edition has in Shanghai, where it has flung open its doors and unveiled 145 rooms alongside ten levels of public space. With a simultaneous launch in Barcelona, plus four more in the works internationally (including the Piero Lissoni-led restoration of a grand but defunct Milanese palazzo,(see W*235), Ian Schrager’s brand is moving at an impressive clip.

Its pace is matched by the designers of its Shanghai outpost, Neri & Hu, who have just finished the city’s sleek Sukhothai hotel and several of its hottest new restaurant spaces. With a collective energy that feels almost nuclear, it’s fitting that the Shanghai Edition occupies a pair of adjacent buildings that once housed electric companies.

Located just off The Bund, the two buildings couldn’t be more different. ‘The challenge was to create a bridge between the vibrancy of the art deco block building and the brutalism of the post-modern tower,’ say Neri & Hu of the hotel’s entrance. It’s perfectly on brand in its upset of the traditional hotel format: the doors open out into a well-polished lobby bar and lounge area set between the two buildings, with no front desk in sight. Behind the bar, natural light pours into a 26m-high atrium, highlighting the historic façade, while cascades of hanging plants soften the space. Throughout the hotel, Carrara marble table tops gleam and the space is punctuated with thoughtfully crafted furniture from the likes of De La Espada and Stellar Works.

In the newer tower, the residential-style rooms and suites are reminiscent of an upscale New York apartment, with a restrained palette of black, white and tan. Pared down and sophisticated, the rooms are finished in light oak and feature white marble bathrooms and the signature Ian Schrager throw on every bed.

But there’s a lot more going on than accommodation here – there are three restaurants, five bars (two of them on the rooftop) and one nightclub, alongside a spa with lap pool and a gentlemen’s club-inspired lounge area, complete with karaoke room and its own bar. The hotel’s contemporary Cantonese restaurant, Canton Disco, is run by Hong Kong restaurant group Black Sheep, while Michelin-starred chef Jason Atherton – who works with both the London and New York Editions – has been brought in to run modern British eatery Shanghai Tavern and the effortlessly chic 27th-floor Japanese izakaya-inspired restaurant Hiya.

An elegant, aged bronze spiral staircase (an Edition signature) leads up to the 35-seater, reservation-only Punch Room bar before spitting you out onto one of the rooftop bars, where you can drink a signature Edition cocktail and drink in stunning views of the historic Bund set against Pudong’s futuristic skyline.

INFORMATION
Website

ADDRESS

199 Nanjing East Road

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Local interior architecture firm Robot 3 Studio has lent its minimally-styled hand to a new coffee atelier in the heart of Shanghai. Adding to the slew of coffee shops across town, which number thousands, making your design mark in this caffeinated city is a tall order (and I don't mean a latte).

While the west increasingly turns to herbal teas, (MUJI is opening up a matcha pop-up in London next week), Shanghai is warming its hands with mugs of Joe. Starbucks placed its largest ever store in Shanghai in December 2017, and a new one opens every 15 hours across China. But smaller coffee ‘boutiques’ (as Robot 3 Studio dubs this one) are also on the rise; with countless cold-brew, hand-pour and other-such ‘hip’ concoctions bubbling away across millennial-propped countertops city-wide.

Time More – the coffee appliance manufacturer behind this new wooden retreat inside Hong Kong Plaza in the Huangpu District – brings an exacting design-eye to proceedings. Founded in 2012 by ‘several coffee lovers’, the press note claims Time More to be ‘the best original hand-washed coffee appliance in the country'. Indeed, Time More is best known for its hand-held appliances that allow for cafe-quality coffee at home or on the go; a Red Dot Design award adds weight to its self-accolade.

If personalised coffee on the go is the big sell for Time More, what could be the benefit of opening a bricks and mortar (in this case, copper and wood) store? More than a simple shop, the new Time More location is a ‘Hand Brew Coffee Experience Center', where visitors can pour their own coffee, to their own exacting standards using Time More products, under the guidance of a trained Barista.

The environment in which the coffee is brewed is crucial, too. ‘We understand this store as a world about "time",’ Robot 3 Studio explains. ‘Coffee beans are alive, making, grinding, extracting, and every step of a cup of coffee requires patience and concentration. We've created a quiet world; time is quietly flowing here. The space is developed in a binary way, moving and static, just and soft, inside and outside, positive and negative. This gives the entire space a certain tension.’ Tension, it seems, that's unwound by the perfect hand-pour.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Time More website

ADDRESS

Hong Kong Plaza
282 Huaihai Zhong Road, Huangpu District
Shanghai, China

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The Artist is Present – this time in Shanghai with Italian artist-cum-curator Maurizio Cattelan and Gucci’s Alessandro Michele, who have come together with 37 fellow artists from both China and throughout the world. But those expecting a re-run of Marina Abramović's controversial solo exhibition at MOMA six years ago (hinted at in the murals of Gucci's accompanying Art Walls) will find nothing about the artist herself.

‘I must admit I was more inspired by its [Abramović's MoMA show's] mediatic success, than the concept of her exhibition itself,’ says Cattelan. So when he and Michele started thinking about this exhibition and ‘the originality of the copy’, they tried to explore every interpretation of the concept of originality.

‘We began thinking in a new way, transforming our minds trying to give new definitions to some of the ideas that seemed so natural to us, like originality and authorship. And the title was a starting point, of course, because you can immediately understand what our intentions are: to give a second life to the thing that already happened, through the act of copying them. The presence of the copy instead of the original, so that the copy becomes the original, is one of the issues we have been obsessed with lately. Which artist wouldn’t want to become Marina for a while?'

The exhibition, which is on show at Shanghai’s Yuz Museum, presents projects by artists who challenge the sacred principle of modern art that originality, intention and expression reign supreme. What if, they are saying, the act of copying can equally be an act of creation, every bit as worthy as the original?

‘The starting point for the show’s concept is the idea that copying is an act of deep awareness of the subject. To copy means to give attention, to value the content that you are replicating. It also adds new meanings to the original concept itself. It keeps the idea alive for the next generations,’ Cattelan explains. ‘The discourse with Michele started from these concepts, and then I remember we started sharing ideas about iconography and icons, and what characteristics have in common – for example madonnas (in the sense of the Virgin Mary) and Madonna.’ 

From the New York Yankees logo to Mickey Mouse, the Paramount Pictures motif and the outfits of Dolly Parton and Janis Joplin, cultural images and symbols are mashed together and reinterpreted by its Gucci's to become the essence of its Michele era. The collaboration between the two unconventional brains has led them to contend that to appreciate a work requires the spectator to create his own judgement about it rather than simply enjoy the abstract notion of the idea of authorship.

In a world where internet and social media allow us increasingly blurred borders between actual and virtual reality, the physical and the digital, they might have a point. But do we then embrace all counterfeiting. Simply: is originality truly overrated?

Notwithstanding the presumption of legitimising the concept of imitation, this is one gripping show. The artwork is sequenced in 17 rooms to create one immersive experience: Chinese artist Xu Zhen has made literal a rampant cliché of contemporary art and global culture, the idea of ‘East meets West’, by brutally stacking Greek God and Buddha statues to form new bodies; New Yorker Margaret Lee rebuilt one of the six windows she designed and installed at Barneys in 2016 as a symbol of culture in luxury consumerism; Cattelan himself has contributed a 1:6 replica of the Sistine Chapel, an uncanny wooden box from the outside but masterly recreated Michelangelo’s 15th-century triumph on the inside, and on a human scale that makes viewing more convenient.

It is worth noting that Cattelan’s appropriation has already begun to replace the original’s digital presence on, for example, Google search. This might be considered a strong argument regarding the relevance of authenticity in this age of algorithm. More interesting – and adhering to the narrative of this exercise – it is believed that Abramovic has not been acknowledged, nor permission even sought for the use of her intellectual property, but it would appear that, for the moment at least, the artist has been canny enough to keep her counsel regarding the prank.

INFORMATION

‘The Artist is Present’ is on view until 16 December. For more information, visit the Yuz Museum website and the Gucci website

ADDRESS

35 Fenggu Road
Xuhui District
Shanghai

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The choice of artist for an inaugural exhibition says a lot about a new gallery. In the case of Perrotin Shanghai (see Wallpaper’s November 2018 issue, out 11 October) showcasing Belgian neo-conceptual artist Wim Delvoye, it also speaks volumes about China’s rapidly diversifying tastes in contemporary art.

Belgian-born Wim Delvoye already has a notorious reputation here for provocative art due to the Art Farm he established in 2003 outside Beijing, where piglets were tattooed with intricate paintings and luxury brand logos. As the pigs grew, the ‘art’ expanded and, after a natural death, the skins were transformed into canvases and framed.

Although Delvoye’s plans to show live tattooed pigs at the 2008 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair led to the work being banned from the exhibition, he remains enthusiastic about working in China. ‘The Chinese authorities are strict but at least things get done here whereas in Brussels the bureaucracy achieves nothing,’ he says.

Several skins feature in this solo exhibition of 30 works at Perrotin Shanghai, which includes earlier pieces such as the quasi-religious Chapel series of stained-glass windows depicting erotic images captured by MRI scans, a laser-cut steel Twisted Dump Truck, and the twisted ivory marble sculptures, embossed aluminium works including a fire extinguisher decorated by Iranian craftsmen and a replica of China’s most popular instant noodle pot carved in onyx that he is making now.

Material and scale vary dramatically but Delvoye’s idiosyncratic fusion of humour, anarchism and exquisite craftsmanship is instantly recognisable throughout. The combination was clearly an attraction for the young collectors who flocked to the opening of the 1,300 sq m André Fu-designed gallery on Shanghai’s Bund. ‘They are attracted to pieces that take a lot of work because they want good value for their money,’ Delvoye says.

This experience is markedly different to his memory of Shanghai in 2002: ‘Then I managed to meet everyone who was important in art in just one day; now it would take a couple of years. Today there are so many curators and many young people buying art – almost without thought – but they are very well informed.’

The artist says future projects may include designing a cemetery. ‘It’s perfect. You can be quite authoritarian. Every artist is a dictator; that is the attraction of making art and the attraction of collecting.’

Perrotin Shanghai’s inaugural exhibition will be followed by a monumental show of works by Japanese artist Takashi Murakami.

INFORMATION

‘Wim Delvoye’ is on view until 20 October. For more information, visit the Perrotin website

ADDRESS

Perrotin Shanghai
Room 501
27 Hu Qiu Road
Huangpu District
Shanghai

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