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Metropolis Editors, Natural Habitat, sustainability, sustainable architecture

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The Alila Yangshuoh hotel in the autonomous region of Guangxi on the Vietnamese border is the work of Dong Gong’s firm Vector Architects. Instead of tearing down a 1960s-era sugar factory, Gong repurposed the masonry structure to house the hotel’s reception, restaurant, and other common areas, while guest rooms were added in a new concrete volume next door. COURTESY SHENGLIANG SU

October 14, 2021

At MoMA, an Exhibition Highlights Chinese Architecture far from Megaprojects

Reuse, Renew, Recycle: Recent Architecture from China hints at a new style of Chinese architecture that is grounded in materiality, sustainability, and history.

By: Ethan Tucker

Throughout the 21st century so far, China has experienced a building boom on a scale so massive that it is difficult to comprehend. The amount of construction is perhaps best expressed in terms of materials used: Scientist, economist, and University of Manitoba professor Vaclav Smil estimates that the People’s Republic of China poured more concrete between 2011 and 2013 than the United States used in the entire 20th century. Fortunately, behind all of that concrete and steel, a new generation of Chinese architects have been quietly incubating a different sort of architecture.

“They want to move away from this very detached megaproject approach to something that is much more grounded in the history of the country, the material traditions, and the environment.”

Martino Stierli, Philip Johnson chief curator of architecture and Design, MoMA

A new exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Reuse, Renew, Recycle: Recent Architecture from China (on view from September 18, 2021, through July 4, 2022), investigates eight projects that show the diversity and dynamism of contemporary architecture in the world’s most populous country. Organized by Martino Stierli, the Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design, and Evangelos Kotsioris, curatorial assistant, Department of Architecture and Design, with advice from Professor Li Xiangning of Tongji University in Shanghai, the projects illustrate a shift toward careful site planning, recycled materials, repurposed structures, and an engagement with craft. Standing in direct contrast to China’s well-known urban megadevelopments and splashy office towers—many of which are designed by Western firms—the architecture amplified by these practitioners prizes social and environmental sustainability. 

“Most of the architects in the show are roughly the same age and many of them have been trained in the west or have worked for western offices that have built on a massive scale in China in the past few decades,” says Stierli, “They want to move away from this very detached megaproject approach to something that is much more grounded in the history of the country, the material traditions, and also the environment.”

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