A Naturally Grown “Firm

Hangzhou Dongxin Hechuang Creative Park was formerly a factory area of Eastcom Group, China’s largest telecom provider in the 1950s and 1960s, but it later fell behind the times and gradually declined. Within the park, Building 25 was previously an ordinary dormitory for local workers, and it began to be rented as an office building for GID in 2021.





With dual roles as owner and architect, the design team transformed the building from inside to outside and focused on three key aspects of the renovation: natural elements, green energy, and space expansion.





Natural elements: Building 25’s original closed exterior wall was removed and replaced with floor-to-ceiling sliding doors and glass windows. The public activity area on the ground floor was extended to an outdoor courtyard in both directions in order to more deeply embed the natural landscape into the building area.





Green energy: The prefabricated aluminum shading frame structure with the surrounding forest environment, creates an environmentally friendly, energy-saving building.





Space expansion: A sunken space had been designed to increase the height of the entrance hall, enhancing the usability and flexibility of the public space, while the new loft creates a relatively private area for rest.





We take this building as an experiment site and try to create an interior that meets the work, communication, and rest needs of the architect, and an exterior that integrates the culture and creativity of the surrounding park. "Solving site problems with relatively pure design methods" is the original intention of this renovation. The project was completed in the middle of winter when the surrounding forest environment was leafless and hidden from view, which echoed with the new building's cool color tones and metal sun visors. This relationship is reversed in the summer, the lush forest completely encloses the slightly rough building, at which point nature and architecture humbly blend with each other.