The ‘Eye of Pingshan’, which is located in the heart of Pingshan, China has just been chosen as the gold winner of the 2022 Urban Design and Architecture Design Awards. Designed by the ever ambitious team at RMJM Shenzhen, the site is intended to be a skyscraping marvel that cohesively accommodates the towers and podium of the multi-use areas; a 281,000 SQM, 250m super-rise tower encompasses 96,000 SQM of office space, 43,000 SQM of retail space, and 50,000 SQM hotel space.
The Urban Design and Architecture Design Awards is an exceptional level of acknowledgement globally for outstanding ideas within the prestigious world of highrise architecture. Ideas that redefine the concept of design through the implementation of both classical techniques such as materials and aesthetics, as well as recognising that of the digital revolution. An assessment that examines the relationship between architecture and the natural world, and architecture and the surrounding city is what decides the allocation of awards and as such this is a noteworthy moment in RMJM’s story.
Read on to find out more about this award winning project by RMJM Shenzhen.
The masterplan of the project is laid out tight and efficiently, which establishes systematic routes for pedestrians and public transport. The 24-hour urban public passageway on the underground floor conveniently connects the subway station, underground retail, and bus terminal, binding the project with the surrounding city.
When creating the project, our architects took as their inspiration the age-old, universal ideas of creating openings and enclosures to define a language and plan appropriate to the project’s urban design and the client’s brief.
Openings are an idea of creating and embracing a bright future, the integration of multiple external physical and cultural environments. The joining layers flow seamlessly together to define and shape a new and appropriate urban place.
Enclosures are an idea of creating a series of defined functional zones that when linked together form a community, an urban environment that, when completed, will enhance the lives of all visitors at many levels.
Openness and enclosure are not just simple visual metaphors or modelling techniques to be used when creating a project, they are concepts that facilitate the construction of a series of diverse linked, interactive three-dimensional spaces; spaces that enable and enhance the complex cultural, social, and economic interactions that define modern public and private urban living.
The sensuous curves of the super high-rise IM Landmark Tower flow to create a bright eye, giving the core idea of “opening” a strong visual metaphor. The building is full of life, one that hoists the working lives of many thousands, and at the top we find the calmness of the Marriott Hotel, whose sky lobby is placed within an eye, looking out towards the surrounding city and the world beyond.
Diagonally across the site is the smaller and more intimate Boutique hotel tower. As a mirrored pair, the projects frame and locate the beating heart and core of the development, the IM JoyLINK retail centre. This is then topped by the crowning IM CUBE office building. These four key commercial elements define the commercial reasoning for OCT to build this mixed-use development.
Linking the core components together is a large-scale urban podium park. Created as a tactile sensory experience, it’s an oasis within the complex building forms that both define and enclose it. This warm, vibrant green sky garden naturally leads the community to the creative and cultural heart of the development, the linked OCT Imagination Centre, IM Art Space, and IM Cloud.
With the support of OCT, the concept of “the Eye of Pingshan” was born – the project is meant to brighten up the city with the imagery of welcoming eyes and announce itself by embracing classic and modern, simplicity and elegance, rationality and romance. The completion of the project will continue to empower the development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
