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Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans by Minjie Si and Xianfeng Ye

Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans by Minjie Si and Xianfeng Ye is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2022 A' Design Award de Bronze in Disseny d'Arquitectura, Edificació i Estructures Competition Category.


BronzeArquitectura· 2022

Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans

by Minjie Si and Xianfeng Ye

Client: Vrap

A' Design Award de Bronze Winner in Arquitectura Category

Colors

The Design

About Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans

Es va escollir una casa de pedra en ruïnes situada a l'entrada del poble com a emplaçament del centre d'activitats comunitàries. El repte del disseny és acomodar al màxim la preservació de l'estructura original i la instal·lació de noves funcions. Al solar es conserven dos arbres existents, al voltant dels arbres es van construir unes escales suportades per tubs d'acer, que condueixen a una nova plataforma que també serveix d'entrada al segon pis. Construït durant la pandèmia, el projecte es va completar principalment pels locals mitjançant un procés participatiu comunitari amb mètodes de baixa tecnologia.

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award de Bronze

Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans és un guanyador del guardó A' Design Award de Bronze, un reconeixement altament prestigiós concedit a dissenys sobresortints que es distingeixen per la creativitat, l'enginy i l'astúcia. Els guanyadors de Bronze són artefactes ampliament hàbils i sorprenentment creatius que autentiquen la vasta experiència, la imaginació i el recurs dels seus dissenyadors. Es preveu que Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans sigui un objecte molt apreciat, admirat i estimat, notablement professional i innovador. Aquest disseny guanyador del guardó A' Design Award de Bronze incorpora les millors pràctiques de l'art, la ciència, el disseny i la tecnologia i és excel·lent per la seva atenció al detall. Stone White El Centre D'activitats Dels Vilatans satisfà esplèndidament les necessitats, toca els desitjos, encisa els sentiments i crida la curiositat.

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties
The activity center for villagers was built during epidemic time, mainly by the locals through community participatory process with low-tech methods. A balance is achieved between built and preserved, specificity and generality, immediacy and evolutionary instinct. The objective is to build open public infrastructure, by reusing the existing traces and imagining their future development. It's a matter of reading the richness of a specific context in order to plan new rurality, capable of stimulating both villagers and out comers.
Dimensions & Packaging
preserved stone wall with thickness of 400mm; light steel structure as main structure to strengthen the existing stone wall and support the new white house above, main column with the dimension of 100mm*100mm; steel tubes with different diameters 30mm,40mm and 50mm are used as an alternative supporting system for stairs and platform.
Tags
regeneration, rural design, stone, tree house, community center, light steel structure
Production Technology
preserved stone wall with thickness of 400mm; light steel structure as main structure to strengthen the existing stone wall and support the new white house above; steel tubes with different diameters 30mm,40mm and 50mm are used as an alternative supporting system for stairs and platform.
Design Challenge
It is difficult to calculate how much steel we need to use to strengthen the existing stone wall and it is difficult to calculate whether we have used enough metal tubes to support the stair and platform. Both the structure is informal, which can only be tested on the site by doing a mock-up. Intelligent reuse and demolishing of the stone wall is also a challenge.
Research
We are trying to achieve a delicate balance between strategy and form, built and preserved, rigor and freedom, specificity and generality, immediacy and evolutionary instinct. The objective is to build open public infrastructures, by reusing the existing traces and imagining their future development. In short, it's a matter of reading the richness of a specific context in order to plan rural culture buildings, capable of stimulating both villagers and out comers.
Inspiration
The activity center for villagers was arranged at the entrance of the community during the regeneration of Feiyue Village, calling for reusing the ruin site of a stone house. The design comes up with the challenge that how to intelligently preserve the original structure and build on the existing traces. A new light-structured white house therefore was designed to rise above the heavy stone walls. Two trees are kept on the site, embraced by steel-tube-supported stairs, give a guide to the new platform above the originals.
Project Duration
The design started in May 2019 and finished in November 2019 in Beijing. The construction of the project started in November 2019 and finished in October 2020 in Feiyue Village, Qichun County, Hubei Province.
Operation Flow
It was built during epidemic time, mainly built by the local villagers through a community participatory process with low-tech methods. Since few people can be found from outside for construction during that special time and same for the transportation of construction materials. Despite of essential light steel structure, we used the metal tubes with different diameters 30mm,40mm and 50mm as an alternative supporting system, which was one of the most economical materials and easy for handcraft.
Patents
Copyrights belong to Minjie Si, 2021
Team Members
Design Team: Minjie Si, Weixiong Jiang, Xue Li, Xuejiao Li, Xinfei Guo
Construction & Manage Team: Xianfeng Ye, Zulong Zheng
Image Credits
Image 1: Photographer Minjie Si, "Stone White" and the Vernacular Surroundings, 2021
Image 2: Photographer Minjie Si, Feiyue Village, 2021
Image 3: Photographer Minjie Si, Aerial View of "Stone White", 2021
Image 4: Photographer Minjie Si, White House above the Preserved Stone Wall, 2021
Image 5: Photographer Minjie Si, Tree Staris, 2021

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