Vanke Meizhou Cultural Village Architectural Colonies of Contemporary Regionalism and Destinations of Cultural Tourism

The Challenge

Located on the bank of the Minjiang River in the Meishan Mountain, Chengdu, Meizhou Cultural Village Base shines as an elegant landscape, with its rich and long-standing Western Shu Culture. Meizhou is the hometown of Three Sus, an ancient place propitious for giving birth to great men, including famous ancient Chinese poets, scholars and politicians. Currently, Meizhou is a small livable city on the outskirts of the metropolis of Chengdu with a strong leisure and food culture.

The challenge was figuring out how to maintain the gorgeous scenery of the base and to establish a premier example of a modern Song-style culture town in China through the natural and cultural landscape, based on profound cultural fundamentals in Meishan such as “Song Dynasty Background, Shu Studies Culture and Three Sus Culture.”

The Design Solution

Meizhou Cultural Village vividly displays and exemplifies traditional Chinese business formats in modern times under exquisitely created spaces.

By taking advantage of multiple transportations and water systems between Taoyuan Lake and inner lakes, Meizhou Cultural Village utilizes natural river resources to create multiple landscape experiences, including “One Street,” “One Stage,” “One Banquet” and “One Night.”

With a modern Song-style commercial street designed with pedestrian focus, a mix of uses and connections to nature, the entire city is endowed with new functions for leisure and vacation. The customized double-sided stage connects Taoyuan Lake on the west and Neihu Lake on the east, providing a variety of ways to showcase performances in different scales and themes.

The ballroom with Song-style blends indoor and outdoor, and the B&Bs with oriental aesthetics complement each other with the classic architectural shapes of the modern Song Dynasty with large roofs, oriental rain chains, flags and hazy translucent grilles. The buildings use systematic and modular rules to realize the contemporary expression of a thousand-year-old civilization.

The Design Impact

As the second “cultural village” project of Vanke, one of China’s largest developers, the project has become a high-quality public activity space for local citizens in Meishan. The contemporary Song-style commercial street provides a venue for events at various festivals. The elegant ballroom has become a fashionable place for Meishan citizens to hold wedding banquets. Its completion presents Meishan as a poetic scenery beyond imagination and a brand new and symbolic cultural tourism destination.