Deep ground

TYPE Cultural, Infrastructure, Public space
STATUS Competition 1st prize
LOCATION Longgang, Shenzhen, PR China
YEAR 2008
CLIENT Longgang Municipality

DESIGN TEAM Eva Castro, Ulla Hell, Holger Kehne
COLLABORATORS Groundlab

The project deals with the regeneration of 11.8 Km2 of the urban fabric in the centre of Longgang, north east of Shenzhen in the Pearl River Delta, with an estimated population of 350,000 and 9,000,000 m2 of new development area.
The aim is to expand the range and expressive forms of urbanism in order to meet the current challenges of modern China: the concept of ‘thickened ground’ merges multiple reference levels to create intuitive orientation and connectivity. The heavily polluted and neglected river is transformed into an ecological corridor, while the existing inner-city villages are preserved and developed into urban nodes. In this way, they give the new urban fabric identity, vitality, and a human scale.