Steven Holl Architects-designed new Shanghai Cofco Cultural and Health Center building have topped out in Shanghai, China. The firm has released latest photographs of the building and they show the exoskeleton of the concrete building is almost complete.

Called Shanghai Cofco Cultural and Health Center, the plans comprises two new buildings: cultural building and health center which are separated with circular landscape elements. 

Steven Holl Architects unveiled its conceptual design in 2016 and the project was approved in 2017. 

The project aims at "being a social condenser, fostering community among the residents of the surrounding new housing blocks with a public space and park along an existing canal." 

While the adjacent housing blocks are repetitive, here the architecture is of spatial energy and openness, inviting the whole community in for recreational and cultural programs. The project is expected to be completed in Fall 2020, as the firm highlights. 

Shaping a central public space, the Health Center and Cultural Center are exoskeletal concrete construction. The design is made of subtractive cuts in the concrete structure which carries on the space shaping architectural language.

Sketch by Steven Holl

Sketch by Steven Holl

The landscape and two new public buildings are merged by the concept of "clocks and clouds" The landscape is organized in large, clocklike circles forming a central public space, and the buildings are cloud-like in their porosity and openness. 

The Cultural Center hovers over a transparent glass base that exposes a café and game and recreation rooms. A curved ramp, climbing gently up to the second floor, creates a continuous experience of overlooking.

The Health Center is also shaped by the curves of the landscape. Both buildings have green sedum roofs, which merges them further with the landscape when seen from the surrounding apartment buildings. A quarter-circle pool and fountain reflect the building’s central space and provide rainwater recycling. 

Sketch by Steven Holl

Sketch by Steven Holl

Site plan

Site section

Cultural Center - level 1 plan

Health Center - ground level plan

Project facts

Architect:

Steven Holl Architects
Steven Holl (Design Architect)
Roberto Bannura (Partner-in-Charge)
Xi Chen, Sihuan Jin (Project Architects)
Noah Yaffe, Wenying Sun, Ruoyu Wei, Dimitra Tsachrelia, Okki Berendschot, Pu Yun, Elise Riley, Lydia Liu, Tsung-Yen Hsieh, Michael Haddy, Yi Ren, Xu Zhang, Hong Ching Lee, Peilu Chen, Yuanchu Yi, Lidong Sun, Zhu Zhu (Project Team)

Associate architects: East China Architectural Design & Research Institute

Structural engineer: East China Architectural Design & Research Institute

Facade design: Windafacade

Program: 

Health Center: health education area, pharmacy, consultation rooms, exam rooms, physical therapy room, ultrasound / xray rooms, nursery, admin & doctors lounges

Cultural Center: exhibition area, table game area, cafe, library, gym, community & youth activity areas

Cultural center area: 6030m2

Health center: 1490m2

Site area: 7520m2

All images courtesy of Steven Holl Architects

> via Steven Holl Architects