Platinum Architecture, Building and Structure Design · 2025
Golden Key Venue Industrial and Office Building
- A' Design Award 2025 Platinum Winner in Architecture, Building and Structure Design
- Awarded April 15, 2025
- CLIENT: MADA s.p.a.m. LLC
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 6,982,986
- Verification code 1C1E80DB10 · Verify this award
About Golden Key Venue Industrial and Office Building
Golden Key Venue is an office building in Shanghai, China, created by transforming a former warehouse. Three low-rise blocks are linked to a high-rise zone. A 26 meter cantilever is supported by two tilted columns clad in mirror finish stainless steel. The facade is made of 28,000 red terracotta panels, giving a minimalist campus-like appearance, while ultra-white glass curtain walls form the upper level. Stacked volumes create loft-like interiors. Courtyards, terraces, rooftop gardens and green spaces along Chuanqiao Road connect users with nature.
MADA s.p.a.m. LLC's Golden Key Venue Industrial and Office Building emerges as a distinguished contribution to contemporary architectural practice, demonstrating sophisticated synthesis of industrial typology with refined aesthetic sensibility. The design engages meaningfully with ongoing discourses surrounding adaptive materiality, environmental responsiveness, and the humanization of workplace environments through strategic landscape integration. The terracotta-toned vertical screen system appears to reference historical precedents of brise-soleil design while advancing the vocabulary through contemporary material innovation and precise fabrication techniques. Technical accomplishment manifests in the calibrated relationship between solid and void, where the dense rhythmic facade of the lower volume achieves visual permeability through the aggregation of slender elements, creating an optical texture that transforms throughout diurnal cycles as shadow angles shift. The building's bipartite composition establishes productive tension between the grounded earthen warmth of the primary workplace volume and the ascending translucent tower, suggesting perhaps a dialogue between pragmatic function and aspirational lightness. The rooftop courtyard void introduces unexpected spatial generosity within the building's mass, activating what might otherwise remain utilitarian roof surface as contemplative landscape amenity. Chromatic choices demonstrate environmental attunement, with the warm oxidized palette establishing visual dialogue with both earth and sky while providing dignified presence within the surrounding urban fabric. The integration of extensive green roofing and perimeter landscaping suggests commitment to ecological principles and occupant wellbeing, embedding the building within natural systems rather than standing apart from them. Viewers might consider how the repetitive architectural elements create both visual rhythm and functional performance, mediating environmental conditions while establishing distinctive architectural identity.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- This project explores urban norms through three low-rise blocks linked to a high-rise zone, with two slanted columns. It integrates green spaces along Chuanqiao Road and uses stacked volumes for a loft-like design. The facade, with 28,000 red ceramic tiles, offers a minimalist "academic-style" look, while courtyards, terraces, and rooftop gardens foster creativity and nature connection.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The site covers an area of 11,000 square meters, with a total building area of 36,000 square meters (22,000 square meters above ground and 14,000 square meters underground). The building has a height of 40 meters, with 5 floors above ground and some areas reaching 8 floors.
- Tags
- Urban Catalyst, Urban Renewal, Industrial Architecture, Architectural Transformation, Green Spaces, Community, Research and Development, Cantilever Architecture
- Production Technology
- The building features a 26-meter cantilever supported by two tilted, mirror-finish stainless steel columns, creating a surreal spatial effect. The facade, made of 28,000 red terracotta panels, evokes a minimalist campus-style aesthetic with green trees and red walls. The upper portion showcases glazed ultra-white glass curtain walls, forming a distinct two-level architectural design.
- Design Challenge
- The design’s challenge lies in the 26 meter cantilever, supported by two inclined giant columns wrapped in mirror finish stainless steel. These columns extend from the ground to the ceiling, creating a seamless, suspended effect. Balancing structural integrity with the delicate reflective surfaces required close coordination between engineering and design, ensuring both stability and visual impact. Achieving strength, elegance, and a surreal spatial experience was essential to the project’s success.
- Project Duration
- The design phase of the architectural project began in 2021, with construction completed in 2024.
Location: 1065 Chuanqiao Road, Shanghai, China - Operation Flow
- Through the collaboration between Shanghai Pharma Holdings and Jinqiao Group, an old warehouse has been transformed into a landmark innovation hub in the Jinqiao Sub-center. Magsense Health has settled in the project, with biopharmaceutical companies like Huashi Pharmacy and Huantong Technology joining soon. This initiative is fostering a synergistic biopharmaceutical ecosystem, positioning the area as a key industry hub and a Shanghai benchmark for urban renewal driving new productivity.
- Research
- The Golden Key Venue, located at 1065 Chuanqiao Road in Pudong's Jinqiao area, was formerly the Huashi Storage Warehouse under Shanghai Pharma Group. The five-story, 2,700 sqm building was in disrepair and had low land-use efficiency, affecting the surrounding industrial community. As part of Jinqiao Sub-center's broader transformation, Shanghai Pharma Holdings and Jinqiao Group, two state-owned enterprises, have spearheaded this urban renewal project.
- Inspiration
- Urban structures possess an inherent logic that requires rationality and knowledge to shape, forming a driving force for urban behavior - an Urban Catalyst. Its purpose is to influence other elements, attracting talent to collectively create a vibrant, cohesive city, driven by empowered industries, urban construction, productivity integration, vitality creation, and regeneration.
- Image Credits
- Image #1: Photographer Vincent Wu, 2024.
Image #2: Photographer Vincent Wu, 2024.
Image #3: Photographer Vincent Wu, 2024.
Image #4: Photographer Vincent Wu, 2024.
Image #5: Photographer Vincent Wu, 2024.
Video Credits: MADA s.p.a.m LLC, 2024
Colors of Golden Key Venue Industrial and Office Building
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