Jing ‘An Kerry Centre, a multi-use complex conveniently located near Jing ‘An Temple is an integrated development in Shanghai’s Jing ‘An District. The 450,000 sqm complex features retail, office, the Jing An Shangri-La Hotel, residential, and underground parking facilities. Easily accessible on Nanjing Road, one of the world’s busiest shopping streets, this landmark mixed-use development fuses the neighbourhood’s historic character with the creativity of modern Shanghai, and serves as a signature landmark for the city. Attractive avenues of Zelkova and Camphora line the paved ramps within gardens of Buxaceae and seasonal flowers. This helps guide people away from the busy street and into the heart of the development.
The site contains a preserved house where Mao Zedong stayed in the 1920’s and employs a landscape piazza with an interactive fountain. Rather than literally celebrate a bygone era of Mao, we chose to meet the psychological and practical demands of a contemporary Chinese society with interaction found through an interactive plaza where space is formed naturally from a retail and F&B edge. This encourages activity to spill inward towards the dancing fountain as a central pulse of the square. The dry fountain is at times ‘decommissioned’ for seasonal activities such as markets and art fairs. The goal and challenge here was to establish a public space between buildings without automobiles that delivers what is needed most: social and cultural inclusiveness for the past while giving promise of a new and better life to those destined to re-inhabit these artifacts of a bygone era.
Anyi Avenue brings the two blocks together with an architectural language embodying the qualities of the city street experience. Textured paving and bollards help slow vehicular traffic and the planting of a large avenue of Zelkova trees help unify a project divided by the street. The central gardens with open air walkways lined with shops echo the signature character of the complex and evoke a sense of continuity with the surrounding pedestrian scale.
For our model we need only to look at the mature urban areas of historic Shanghai. Low and mid-rise mixed-use neighborhoods offer a great diversity of building typologies for both residential and commercial uses. Spatial connections between public and private spaces are enriched by a dense network of alleys and lanes, streets, numerous intersections for crosswalks, small plazas and parks, and shaded sidewalks with outdoor seating. Children and adults laugh and play around square as friends and family watch from the cafés.
Client: Shanghai Jing’an Kerry Properties Co., Ltd
Architect: Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates (KPF)
Project location: 1515 Nanjing West Road, Jing’an District, Shanghai, China
Design year: 2010-2014
Year Built: 2016
