Platinum Interior Space and Exhibition Design · 2020
Chongqing Zhongshuge Bookstore
by Xiang Li
- A' Design Award 2020 Platinum Winner in Interior Space and Exhibition Design
- Awarded April 15, 2020
- CLIENT: X+Living
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 749,284
- Verification code F6196FCE67 · Verify this award
About Chongqing Zhongshuge Bookstore
Incorporating the splendid landscape of Chongqing in the bookstore, the designer has created a space where the visitors may feel like in the charming Chongqing while reading. There are five types of reading area in total, each of which is like a wonderland with distinctive features. Chongqing Zhongshuge bookstore has provided the consumers with a more fancy experience that they are not able to gain through the online shopping.
Li Xiang's Chongqing Zhongshuge Bookstore emerges from a distinguished lineage of experiential retail environments that transform commercial spaces into cultural destinations through architectural innovation and phenomenological engagement. The designer demonstrates exceptional command of spatial illusion, employing mirrored ceiling planes to create a seemingly infinite vertical dimension that dissolves the boundary between built reality and reflected fantasy. Technical achievement manifests in the precise calibration of stepped platforms that serve triple functions as circulation, seating, and display while maintaining rigorous geometric discipline throughout the composition. The chromatic strategy reveals sophisticated understanding of how neutral wood tones provide visual rest while concentrated book spine colors create rhythmic punctuation that guides the eye through complex spatial sequences. One observes particular accomplishment in the seamless integration of practical retail requirements with poetic architectural expression, where every functional element participates in the broader narrative of knowledge as infinite resource. The work engages thematically with longstanding cultural associations between libraries and sacred spaces, suggesting through its cathedral-like verticality and meditative atmosphere that the accumulation of books represents a form of spiritual practice. Iconographic resonances with Piranesi's imaginary prisons and Borges's Library of Babel invite contemplation of knowledge as labyrinth, where the seeker navigates endless pathways toward understanding. The viewer might consider how architectural environments shape our relationship to information and whether spaces designed for books can themselves become vessels of meaning that transcend their commercial purpose.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- Designer utilized the mirror ceiling in order to make the space seem more spacious. The visually stunning bookstore enables the readers to feel the magnificence of the cityscape in a closed and confined space, which is definitely a fantastic real-life experience that the internet simply could not offer. Designer also well-integrated the function and aesthetics in the Escher-like space, the ladder hall, by making the bookshelf into a ladder-like one where the readers could step on or down.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The floor area of this project is 1300 sqm.
- Tags
- bookstore, chongqing, china, civic interiors, library, cultural
- Production Technology
- Chongqing Zhongshuge greets visitors with a simple glass facade covered with text. Once inside, scattered lampshade-shaped bookshelves are found throughout the dark brown lobby. On the other corner of the lobby is the kids reading room, where the bookshelves are built colorful with drawn landscape, buildings and transportation in Chongqing. Further down the corridor and the kids reading room is the main study, a ladder hall where the stair double as bookshelves and the mirrored ceiling overhead doubles the size of the already astonishing room.
- Design Challenge
- It is a great challenge to present the landscape of a city in a limited space, especially when it is a mountainous city. By utilizing the concept of ladder, the designer was able to show the complex geomorphic environment whereas high space utilization is hard to meet.
- Project Duration
- The project is finished in January 2019 in Chongqing, China.
- Operation Flow
- The Chongqing Zhongshuge greets visitors with a simple glass facade covered with text. The bookshelves reflect on the ground and form a tunnel of books that beckons visitors to follow it deeper into the space and knowledge. It is hoped that visitors to the bookstore can not only read good and new books, but also meet friends of the same interests.
- Research
- Zhongshuge has always strived to become a cultural landmark in the city where it locates. Therefore, designer try to find an element which can be abstracted from the culture of the city and strike a chord among the public.
- Inspiration
- As one of the largest inland city of mountains and rivers in the world, Chongqing is a city full of surprises and wonderful and charming corners. Since ancient times, its landscape and numerous historical sites have attracted many ancient writers and calligraphers. Until today, Chongqing is still a city of attraction to everyone. Designer intended to present the splendid landscape of Chongqing in the bookstore so that the visitors may feel like in the charming city while reading.
- Image Credits
- Image#1: Photographer Shao Feng, Chongqing Zhongshuge, 2019.
Image#2: Photographer Shao Feng, Chongqing Zhongshuge, 2019.
Image#3: Photographer Shao Feng, Chongqing Zhongshuge, 2019.
Image#4: Photographer Shao Feng, Chongqing Zhongshuge, 2019.
Image#5: Photographer Shao Feng, Chongqing Zhongshuge, 2019. - Patents
- Copyrights belong to Shao Feng, 2019.
Colors of Chongqing Zhongshuge Bookstore
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