Location: Shanghai, China.

Architect: Yushe Yuzhu.

The project is a private garden located in suburban Shanghai, designed to provide a balance between modern life and the owner’s inner world. The building is constructed with plain concrete and has a raw surface of hand-made marks, which enhances its vitality among the trees. The relationship between the building and trees is emphasized in the design, with the architects reserving most of the existing trees with the least removal and addition. The building is supposed to ‘grow up’ among the trees, with concrete walls of different heights stretching between the building and trees to create vivid spaces with a sense of both cleanness and variedness. The building has three parts for working, relaxing, and living connected by terraces and corridors, with window openings defining frames of nature indoors. The owner can feel a variety of nature scenes in different seasons, making it a place for dancing and sitting in meditation, crying and laughing, as well as thinking and whispering. The project is a journey starting from the entry to the garden, moving through trees with shade and walls of concrete, leaving busy urban life behind.

Photo credit: (T+E) Hu Yijie.