LYCS Architecture's design of the headquarters building for Baoye Group is located in Shanghai Hong Qiao Business District. With the intention of the owner's Shaoxing culture of bridge and water, the three main buildings with inner courtyards are connected by a bridge, and combined with the highly recognizable water ripple form façade, forming a unique headquarters building in the business district. The project is a three-star green building, LEED Gold, and is dedicated to creating an inspiring office environment that gives users a multi-layered architectural experience and sense of space. In dialogue with the complex diversity of the city, it takes into account the order of the classical Chinese garden, visual perception, spatial relationship and the harmonious coexistence of architecture and courtyard.
The complex site conditions posed a design challenge. While maximizing the perimeter, four levels were stretched to meet the area requirements; the volume boundaries were extruded according to the entrance, park and green space, creating three independent and mutually top-angled courtyards. The three courtyards are shaped into different characters. The central courtyard is the most open and a place for public activities. The southern courtyard connects the central courtyard and the park and is a semi-open landscape courtyard. The northern courtyard is a water courtyard that provides a quiet place for offices. Internal flows and outdoor spaces overlap in the central courtyard, a balance negotiated between function and form within the many constraints of the site.
The balance of volume enclosure and spatial sequence, functional use and wandering experience brought about by these operations is a breakthrough from the "space efficiency" rule of contemporary office buildings. Since Bloomberg's New York office building first used open-plan offices to greatly improve the efficiency of the single-room model, high space efficiency and high "occupancy" have been important rules for office building design.
This design prioritizes "spatial quality efficiency" over area efficiency in office buildings, creating an inspiring environment by seamlessly integrating outdoor landscape and greenery with the interior, increasing light, ventilation, and multi-layered spatial experiences for users. The result is a highly efficient office building that surpasses those solely focused on area efficiency.
The project's façade design breaks from the monolithic design of contemporary office buildings, which stack floor plans and facades vertically for "area efficiency." The new design includes modular sunshade panels that create a fluid horizontal gradation, and a sky corridor, giving the impression of a bridge over water. The panels' varied slopes also adjust the window height to control light in the interior.
Each screen panel is made of GRC, a material with as many as a thousand panels for the entire curtain wall. Digital algorithms are used to logically analyze the cells to form the curtain wall optimization scheme, making it possible to eventually use 26 types of unit screen panels to compose the overall façade changes and to deepen the construction and construction process throughout the curtain wall. Each panel is also a façade component that integrates perimeter protection, lighting, shading, ventilation, and night lighting, and is first prefabricated and assembled in the factory, and then lifted and assembled on site.
The designer's involvement in the project is also gradually extended, from the beginning of the architectural design to the overall design and control of landscape and curtain wall and to the integrated design of architecture and interior. This integrated design process fully and meticulously realized the comprehensive design from site planning to a door handle.
.jpg)
