A8 Competition | Ou Ning X A8: Tianfu Park Lawn Designer Call-Up

THE LAWN

No. 202155000

Designer Call-Up

Curator：Ou Ning

For a city, the park is the carrier of the city's history and culture, the museum of the city's development relics, and a part of the city's memory. In the context of the COVID-19, as the epidemic gradually eases, we expect to have public green spaces with high quality and vitality to allow people to walk, stretch, gather, interact, and rediscover the importance of public spaces for social interaction in urban areas. 

Under the background of "construction of Park City", Sichuan Tianfu New Area sets the optimization and harmony of the relationship between "citizen - park - city" as an important content to create a better life, and upgrades the concept of urban planning from the "park in the city" to the "city in the park"  to form the new pattern of the harmonious development of man and nature. In the Headquarter Business District of Tianfu New Area, Sichuan Province, there is a 55,000-square-meter lawn, which is expected to attract more people and become a leisure destination for citizens through space optimization and content planning. The lawn needs：

4 Designers

to join, and team-up 

with the curator Ou Ning

In the way of curatorial thinking and workshop

Discuss from multiple perspectives:

Remolding and Continuous Activation of Public Green Space

Build a New Identity of the City 

with Public Green Space

Tianfu Park Lawn

01

Green Space as City Identity

Hyde Park

Hyde Park, which covers an area of 360 acres, was an exclusive deer hunting ground for the royal family until the 18th century, and later became a venue for important political gatherings and other mass events, including the Great Exhibition and the signing of the Hyde Park Agreement. Since the 19th century, Hyde Park has gradually become a popular leisure place for tourists. The natural intimacy between animals and people can be seen everywhere, and the beautiful scenery can be seen against the sun. The riverside scenery is very relaxing, which makes it a perfect place for Londoners to spend weekends.

Hyde Park

At the same time, Hyde Park has always enjoyed a stable flow of people, not only because of its natural conditions, but also because of the constant renewal and seasonal customization of the park's projects. For example, Winter Wonderland, a winter-limited amusement park, activates the winter time in the form of a small amusement park and a market. Speakers' Corner, near the stone arch, is where speeches are made on Sunday afternoons. The most popular activity is the gun salute ceremony on monarch's birthday. The audience will come to the park from all directions. Every summer, there will be a "seatless concert" to enrich the summer experience of visitors from the cultural and artistic content level.

Hyde Park Events

Parc de la Villette

Parc de la Villette is located in the northeast of Paris, was once used as an abattoir in the 19th century and has been restored since its disuse in 1974. The then French President Francois Mitterrand held a competition for proposals to modernize the city's traditional public spaces, inviting internationally renowned architects such as Zaha and Koolhaas to come up with proposals. Entitled "Urban Parks in the 21st Century," the competition hopes the project will redefine urban parks in a new way.

Parc de la Villette

In terms of content, Parc de la Villette hosts a series of events from January to December in its different spaces, from festivals, fairs, exhibitions, concerts, Paris Comic-Con, Oktoberfest, Fantasy Salon, Vegan Pop, and more. At the same time, Cinema en Plein Air Festival in the summer is a highlight of the park: audiences gather on the large lawn surrounding the Grand Halle Hotel and watch outdoor movies on summer nights, sitting on the grass or on deck chairs under the Parisian sky.

Parc de la Villette Events

Kensington Garden & Serpentine Gallery

Kensington Park, formerly a royal park, is now open to the public and is connected to Hyde Park. The park is elegant, with large tracts of lawn and many artistically manicured green plants. The park has many benches for visitors to relax, and there is also a wide lake where you can see waterfowl, pigeons and squirrels.

Kensington Garden

The Serpentine Gallery, founded in 1970, is located here. It is originally a classical-style teahouse, and now it has become one of London's most popular contemporary art galleries, attracting around 750,000 visitors a year. The gallery has featured artists including Henry Moore, Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst and others. It also hosts the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, a three-month commissioned temporary structure designed every summer to serve as a venue for events such as parties, exhibitions or lectures. During this period, activity “Park Night”, with the Serpentine Gallery and the Serpentine Pavilion at its core, attracts people to participate in art experiments, performances, music and other public events.

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion

02 

THE LAWN:

55,000 m²

Location of Tianfu Park Lawn

Tianfu Park Lawn, located in the Sichuan Tianfu New Area, covers an area of about 55000 square meters which can accommodate 13750 people. The lawn can carry small events such as sports, markets, outdoor movie, etc., which attracts people and become citizens' leisure destination. But at the same time, the lawn is expecting an increase in design:

  Optimize the existing facilities  

  Add more public service facilities  

  Add art installations  

It is expected to bring more convenience to the public and provide possibilities for richer activities and business scenarios covering all time periods in the future. With pioneering design with cultural-sensitive and the sense of quality to build good operating base, with the introduction of public art, increase the art essence, reflect city aesthetics, and through the high quality of cultural activities, art exhibitions, art resides, the introduction of public education, and organization,to attract the public's participation and increase their recognition and a sense of belonging. In the process of continuous optimization and activation, the lawn will be endowed with new meaning, create a new way of life, and shape the contemporary local culture.

At the core of CBD of Chengdu Tianfu New Area

There is a lawn of 55,000 square meters

It reminds us to look back：

Re-examine the change of green space

in the history of urban development

and the iteration of ideas in people’s cognition

It points us to the future：

To construct and shape a new contemporary culture

through content placement, citizen mobilization and ongoing activation

Q: Why Do We Need a Master?

A: A8 Design Center initiated the No.202155000 Designer Call-Up project to carry out multi-dimensional spatial renovation with curatorial thinking around the master. The renovation of Tianfu Park Lawn is complex and diverse, and requires different abilities; but at the same time, all the renovation is for a common idea and vision, which needs to have a unified tone. Thus, this project adopts the system of "Designer Call-Up", in which the master matches the sub-projects and abilities accordingly, and controls the overall design idea and tonality -- to complete the spatial transformation and improvement with the logic of exhibition planning and curatorial thinking.

Q：Who Can be the Master?

A: As the convenor and coordinator, the master should be social and influential, has his/her own media attributes, and has the courage to go beyond his/her career to humanities, design, art and other fields. At the same time, the master will act as the coordinator of the project, to control the understanding and cognition to the overall project, design direction, style, and provide advices accordingly, in order to make the creation of the entire Tianfu Park Lawn not only has unique design, shows the personality and characteristics of the designers, but also has an inherently consistent logic.

Q：Working Mode?

A: The Designer Call-Up project will adopt a workshop mode. Designers who can participate in the workshop will be selected by their profiles and protfolios. Through the design workshop, the designers will fully understand the project in the early stage and conduct in-depth communication with the master. After confirming each other's understanding of the project and working methods, the final design team will be formed and participate in the project under the integration of the master. 

The recruitment of artists and workshop 

will also be carried out in the later period

Looking forward to the participation of 4 artists

to create art installations

Stay tuned~

Ou Ning

Artist, Curator, Writer

Scroll up to read

Ou Ning is the director of the documentaries San Yuan Li (2003) and Meishi Street (2006); chief curator of the Shenzhen & Hong Kong Bi-city Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture (2009); jury member of 8th Benesse Prize at 53rd Venice Biennale (2009); member of the Asian Art Council at the Guggenheim Museum (2011); founding chief editor of the literary journal Chutzpah!(2010-2014); founder of the Bishan Project (2011-2016); a visiting professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation (2016-2017); and a senior research fellow of the Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research in Boston (2019-2021). His collected writings Utopia in Practice: Bishan Project and Rural Reconstruction is just published by Palgrave Macmillan (2020).

The theme of this design content is the overall improvement of this lawn, which requires an improvement in the user experience while retaining its functional flexibility. Therefore, this project will recruit 4 designers to optimize and transform the entire lawn. On the one hand, redesign the appearance of infrastructure such as air outlets, underground garage walkways, pedestrian walkways, cement pavements, vegetation, etc.; on the other hand, increase necessary public service facilities, such as public toilets, necessary urban furniture such as benches, trash can and so on. It is hoped that through the optimization of relevant process, the experience of citizens will be improved, more people will be attracted, outdoor activities with higher frequency will be activated, and the civic green space as an important public space will be fully activated.

The Designer Call-Up project will adopt unique workshop mode. Several designers will be working in the workshop after being selected to discuss the understanding of the project. They will fully communicate, collaborate, and brainstorm together with the master Ou Ning to study the cultural history of Chengdu as well as the positioning of park city's understanding and cognition, to create a borderless public green space with Chengdu's unique culture.

When the project is launched, Ou Ning will use online live broadcast to discuss the understanding of the urban commons, the research and preliminary exploration of the history of Chengdu parks, and in-depth analysis of the current situation of the lawn. At the same time, he will also talk about his expectations for the designer team and the vision after the renovation of the  lawn.

Scan the QR code 

to add A8 Design Center Assistant WeChat

We will create a group and share the Ou Ning live broadcast link

Continuously update project progress

Listen to Ou Ning's live broadcast 

See how to become his PICK!

Scan the code to get first-hand resources!

03 

Schedule

June 7

Project release

June 7 - June 21

Designer (office) profiles & portfolios collection

The deadline for submission is 23:59 on June 21

June (specific time will be announced)

Ou Ning's live broadcast

June 22 - June 26

Select designers for the workshop

June 27 - June 29

A8 Design Center organizes designers' information

June 30

Finalists designers announcement

July 1 - July 8

Workshop

July 9 - July 12

Confirm the final design team

Make the announcement

July 13 - August 15

Designers complete design and submit works

August 16 - August 19

Report on the design and confirm the final design

04 

Prize

The total prize is RMB 400,000:

A total of four designers will be selected, with a prize of RMB 100,000 each.

* All the above bonuses are pre-tax; the possible travel expenses are not included for the finalists designer; related costs of the finalists designer's developed drawings and the coordination of construction drawings are not included. 

05 

Registration

1. Designers participating in the open call, please send the profiles and portfolios to [e-mail], and indicate in the title "Tianfu Park Lawn". The staff will reply and confirm the information received within 48 hours after receiving the application email.

2. The deadline for the submission of profiles and portfolios is 23:59 on June 21, 2021 (Monday)；

3. Participating designers must ensure the authenticity of their profiles and the originality, uniqueness, and the integrity of intellectual property rights of their portfolio；

4. If you have any questions, please add A8 Design Center WeChat: 187 2846 5309.

06 

Basic Info

06-1 Copyright

In accordance with the relevant Laws of China, the organizer considers that the "contestant" or "author" who voluntarily submits his/her work has made the following irrevocable declaration on the copyright of the submitted work:

1. Original statement

The entries are the original works of the entrants and do not infringe any patents, copyrights, trademarks and other intellectual property rights of anyone else; The work has not been published in newspapers, magazines, websites or other media, has not applied for patents or registered copyrights, has not participated in other competitions, and has not entered commercial channels in any form. Participants guarantee that their entries will not participate in other design competitions or transfer to other parties in the form of the same work for life. Otherwise, the organizer will cancel its qualifications for participation, shortlisting, and awards, withdraw bonuses, prizes, and reserve the right to pursue legal liabilities.

2. Attribution of intellectual property rights of entries

When the author submits a work, he agrees to permanently grant the copyright of the entry to the contest organizer, and the contest organizer can exercise other copyright rights in addition to the author’s authorship, including but not limited to free redesign, use, copying, production, and display of the contest work , publishing and publicity,etc. No other unit or individual may transfer, copy, reprint, disseminate, or extract works in any form without authorization.

3. Review interpretation right

Based on the principles of fairness, impartiality, and openness, the jury has the final right to interpret and judge this event. If there is a dispute about a work, contestants can call the organizing committee to report it and provide corresponding evidence as supporting evidence (such as plagiarism Document), once verified, the qualifications, certificates and trophies of the winners will be cancelled.

06-2 Organizers

Sponsor

Management Committee of Headquarter Business District Tianfu New Area, Sichuan Province

Organizer

Tianfu Investment Group Co., Ltd

A8 Design Center

Plan and Execution

A8 Design Center

关于A8设计中心

About A8 Design Center

A8设计中心（A8DC）依托成都麓湖水城，关注青年设计师成长。通过寻找挖掘有趣或有研究意义的命题，启动设计师驻留、设计竞赛、讲座沙龙、教育合作、设计展览等项目，并通过整合上下游产业链，为青年设计师群体寻求更多展示机会，推动设计产业发展 。与此同时，作为泛设计文化交流的平台，A8设计中心期待通过一系列策划和活动所带来的合作、交流、互动的契机，搭建设计师社群，构建设计师社区，聚拢设计爱好者和相关从业者，促进设计力量的持续迭代、更新和活化。

A8 Design Center (A8DC) is located at Chengdu LUXELAKES Water Town and focuses on the growth of young designers. By looking for interesting or significant topics, a series of activities such as designer residency, design competition, lectures and salons, educational cooperation, and design exhibition will be launched; through the integrating the upstream and downstream industry chains, A8 Design Center seeks to provide more display opportunities for young designers and promotes the development of design industry. At the same time, as a design culture platform, A8 Design Center expects to build a community of designers, gather design enthusiasts and relevant practitioners through a series of activities, and look forward to continuous upgrade, renewal and activation.

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