Project Overview

The Suzhou Sericulture College Former Site Cultural Park (Xiling Hall Park) at XuShuGuan Town Section of the Grand Canal is located along the riverbank of XuShuGuan, one of the "Ten Scenic Spots of the Grand Canal" in Suzhou, namely on the banks of the Grand Canal of Beijing and Hangzhou. Covering a total area of approximately 32700 square meters, it was formerly the site of Suzhou Sericulture Specialized School (1903~1995).
The XuShuGuan Town began in Qin Dynasty, flourished in the canal, and became one of the seven major banknote gates along the canal since the Ming Dynasty. With its favorable geographical position, it has formed three major cultures, namely, banknote pass culture, sericulture culture and mat weaving culture, and has become a major town in the northern gateway--Wuzhi Town.
In 1903, Shi Liangcai founded the Shanghai Private Women's Sericulture School, which was merged into Soochow University in 1995. In the meantime, patriots such as Zheng Pijiang and Fei Dasheng devoted their lives here, writing a glorious chapter for the development of education and the silk industry in China. With the gradual launch of the Suzhou section of the Grand Canal Cultural Belt, the Sericulture Park has a chance for rebirth.

Project Commissioner

Jiangsu Dayangshan Culture and Tourism Group Co., Ltd.

Project Creator

Suyuan Liuji Architectural Design & CSCEC Northwestern Architectural Design Institutes

Team

Landscape architecture design Xia Jiguang, Tong Yang, Guo Wenhao, Li Fuhan, Zhang Chunlin, Fu Yechen, Jia Jing, Jia Lirong, Lei Ruihu, Sun Ninghong, Tao Jingyi, Huang Haonan, Su Menglong,Wang Zhe, Wu Xinzi, Zhao Qiang, Hu Han, Zhao Xiaojing, Song Xinyi, Ge Zhejun, Wang Yihan, Pei Shibo, Cao Chan, Liu Qun
Structural design Yao Yao, Liu Jiangbo, Xue Liming
Water supply and drainage Design Shi Minna, Meng Zhijun, Liu Qun
Electrical Design Zhang Biao, Zhang Jian
Lighting design Wang Zhao, Dong Miaomiao
Logo design Liu Donger, Zhao Yuming

Project Brief

Based on the 1957 mapping map, the design team sorted out the locations of places with campus cultural characteristics and times memories such as the Cuiqing Building and Xiling Hall, restored the campus layout texture, and built an open urban park on the basis of preserving the historical memory of the site, taking the "space-time inheritance of local culture" as the starting point.
The site is divided into three areas: site protection area, ecological conservation area, and comprehensive service area. The site protection area is mainly to repair and restore the existing buildings such as the Cuiqing Building, Xiling Hall, and the meteorological observatory, and create the outdoor landscape by means of low-intervention renewal measures of acupuncture. By rearranging the interaction between the site and the canal, the ecological conservation area combines the concept of a sponge city to shape the grassy slope terrain and create an urban open space. The comprehensive service area connects the north and south areas of the site with the entrance node of the "Road of Hope", combines the ecological parking lot under the Nanjing Bridge and the cultural buildings such as the museum to be built in the second place, and inherits the sericulture and silk weaving culture.

Project Innovation/Need

The Suzhou Sericulture College's Cultural Park embodies the goal of "tracing back and rejuvenation", implementing design strategies based on functional continuation, site reshaping, and ecological revitalization. It translates and reconstructs the memories of the former sericulture campus, weaving an ecological and harmonious living space along the Grand Canal. The park preserves the memories of the sericulture campus while leading the revival of urban culture, having become a new cultural landmark for the Suzhou section of the Grand Canal. After the implementation of the project, the public gathered here for activities, leisure, and fitness, and even held a small market, strolled in the park, recalled the silkworm past, and smelled the canal culture, and the park became a place for new stories.

Design Challenge

The project land occupies three different planning plots of commercial, cultural, and parkland with irregular shapes. The architecture of the Republic of China and the Soviet-style garden complement each other, and the interface between the project and the surrounding environment is complex. How to build a national cultural park in the XuShuGuan section of the Grand Canal, and at the same time do a good job in repairing the historical cultural preservation building of the Sericulture school, extending the memory of the site, activating the utilization, and meeting the needs of all sectors of society, has become the core focus of the project.
In the process of project development, the design team coordinated the design units of architecture, cultural heritage protection, cultural curation, landscape design, lighting design, and other design units that participated in the planning and design of the park professionally, throughout the whole cycle and throughout the whole process. Through a variety of design strategies, make the park rich in change, let visitors immerse in it, slow down, and linger.

Sustainability

The project has always implemented the design concept of low carbon and environmental protection from many aspects, such as retaining the texture of the site, transforming the memory place, and extending the green space. The design preserves the original trees of the campus to the maximum extent possible, protects the natural resources of the old site, and constructs a rainwater reuse system to reduce the rainwater runoff of the site, making the park an "urban sponge" with absorbent function.
The current site material is a direct reflection of the site's characteristics and historical memory. Therefore, the design combines new materials such as fair-faced concrete and previous Parmicon concrete to shape the park's spatial characteristics on the basis of retaining the original old materials and technological characteristics of the site, so as to realize the spatio-temporal blending of the new and the old.
The whole process makes full use of the original ecological base and construction area of the site. By trimming and reusing the original construction materials and building space of the site, continuing high-quality and low-cost construction technology, retaining and superimposing local plants on the site, and improving the carbon sequestration efficiency per unit area of plants, etc., the park's construction impact, production input, and operation cost are minimized. It has effectively realized the green and low-carbon development requirements of the era of the urban cultural highland along the Grand Canal River.

Landscape Design - International - Public

This award celebrates creativity and innovation in the use of practical, aesthetic, horticultural, and environmentally sustainability components, taking into account climate, site and orientation, site drainage and irrigation, human and vehicular access, furnishings and lighting.
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