West Kowloon Building, Cultural Complex, City Park, Image, News, Architect, Project

West Kowloon Development – The Dragon: WKCC

WKCC Development design by Foster + Partners, Architects, UK

17 Sep 2012

West Kowloon M+ Design Competition
West Kowloon Design Competition
The West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) announced today details of the design competition for M+, Hong Kong’s future museum for visual culture and launched an open invitation to architectural practices in Hong Kong and worldwide to submit Expressions of Interest to participate. M+, scheduled for completion in 2017, is an ambitious project. The scale of the museum building alone, at around 60,000 square metres, will be on par with the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Situated on the waterfront in Kowloon at the edge of a 14-hectare park, it will be one of 17 core arts and cultural venues.

9 Mar 2012

West Kowloon Cultural Complex Design Competition

West Kowloon Cultural District Authority Announces Design Competition for its First Arts Venue

(March 9 2012, Hong Kong) The West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) launched today a design competition to deliver one of the first landmark buildings for the West Kowloon Cultural District, the Xiqu Centre. The Chinese opera venue will provide a world-class facility for the preservation and development of the art form in Hong Kong and will be designed to host and produce the finest examples of Cantonese and other Chinese opera performances.

West Kowloon Cultural District Design Competition : WKCC Arts Venue

6 Oct 2011

West Kowloon Development Exhibition

Final public engagement exercise for West Kowloon Cultural District masterplan design by Foster + Partners

30 Sep – 30 Oct 2011

New exhibition of West Kowloon Cultural District plans opens in Hong Kong

The proposed Development Plan is on display at the Hong Kong Heritage Discovery Centre from 30 September to 30 October 2011.

A display of the latest designs for the West Kowloon Cultural District has opened in Hong Kong. This is the third and final public engagement exercise and will last for a month, after which the scheme will be finalised for submission to the Town Planning Board around the end of 2011.

West Kowloon Complex – image : Foster + Partners

Foster + Partners’ masterplan is a framework for a sustainable new urban quarter focused on 17 core arts and cultural facilities. The views expressed by the public during the previous exhibitions have been incorporated into the design – the result is a more diverse sequence of urban spaces, including three new squares along the quarter’s main artery, The Avenue: Xiqu Square, Central Square and Artist Square.

West Kowloon Complex – image by dbox branding & creative

In response to stakeholder demand, West Kowloon Cultural District now includes a Freespace with a 150-seat Music Box; a variety of different Arts Pavilions; installations of public art across the district; and, subject to relevant statutory provisions, a floating arts pontoon along the waterfront and piers for water access. There is an even richer mix of activities – new arts education facilities, resident company centres and arts and crafts studios, all connected by a new ground level public transport system.

Some of the cultural buildings have also been renamed and relocated. The Xiqu Centre has been moved from Central Square to Canton Road, in order to establish better synergy with the neighbourhood. M+ has been relocated from Canton Road to the headland of the Great Park, the focal point of Artist Square. The Concert Hall, now called the Music Centre to reflect its wider function, becomes the focal point of Central Square, together with the Centre for Contemporary Performance, which was formerly a cluster of black box theatres.

Norman Foster said:
“Once again, we have listened to the people of Hong Kong and the design has evolved as a result. We have incorporated the spaces and features that matter most to them – their input is vital to make the new cultural quarter a success long-term. We have been equally inspired by everything that makes Hong Kong such a great place – its energy, the shape of the streets and their rich mixture of activities. In this way, the new quarter will be a familiar extension of the city, but will offer so much more to Hong Kong’s cultural life.”

Mar 2011

West Kowloon Development

Foster + Partners selected to design masterplan for West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong

Foster + Partners has been selected for the design of the 40-hectare masterplan for West Kowloon Cultural District. City Park will be a major cultural centre for music, performing and visual arts, incorporating public spaces and spaces for Chinese culture, living, working, galleries and studios on a dramatic harbour-front site in the heart of Hong Kong. The announcement was made today by Henry Tang, Hong Kong’s chief secretary and chairman of the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority, following the results of the international competition including a year-long public consultation. The project is considered to be the largest cultural initiative in the world today.

West Kowloon Complex – image by dbox branding & creative

The proposal sets the cultural buildings as the jewels in a new urban quarter alongside a magnificent 23-hectare public park. Foster + Partners brings its understanding of urban design and knowledge of Hong Kong to a carbon neutral masterplan that captures the unique character that makes it such a great city.

Lord Foster, Chairman and Founder of Foster + Partners: “This is fantastic news. I have been travelling to Hong Kong for more than 32 years, since the Hongkong Bank first brought us here. This project offers an extraordinary opportunity – it is unprecedented in its scale, scope and vision. City Park will be the catalyst to transform the city locally and regionally, as well as on the world stage. Our design is rooted in Hong Kong’s urban DNA, the distinctive character that makes it such a dynamic city. There really is no other project like it!”

Mouzhan Majidi, Chief Executive of Foster + Partners: “We are honoured to be designing the masterplan for WKCD. As the selected team, we understand the great expectations that the public and stakeholders have of the project. We have come a long way together over the past 10 years and look forward to continuing our work on Hong Kong’s cultural heart. I have happy memories of my seven years living in Hong Kong working on Chek Lap Kok Airport.”

Spencer de Grey, Head of Design at Foster + Partners, said: “We are thrilled with the result and the positive reaction of the people of Hong Kong to our proposal. The city has great significance for our practice, as well as personal significance – in 1979, I moved to Hong Kong with my wife, setting up our office to work on the Hongkong Bank. We are greatly looking forward to fulfilling Hong Kong’s ambitions to be one of the great cultural cities in the world.”

West Kowloon Cultural Complex information from Foster + Partners

WKCC Architects Shortlist

West Kowloon Cultural District Shortlist

Foster + Partners
Office for Metropolitan Architecture
Rocco Design Architects Limited

West Kowloon Cultural Complex – Design by Foster + Partners
1999-
Architect: Foster + Partners

20 Aug 2010

PROPOSALS LAUNCHED FOR FOSTER + PARTNERS’ CITY PARK
AT WEST KOWLOON CULTURAL DISTRICT, HONG KONG

Foster + Partners’ masterplan for West Kowloon Cultural District, on a reclaimed harbour-front site, has been launched in Hong Kong. ‘City Park’ will capture and recreate the DNA that makes Hong Kong such a great city. At its heart, a 23-hectare great park and a green avenue will provide a landscaped setting for a series of spectacular new cultural buildings – the jewels in Hong Kong’s architectural crown. These new buildings will be approachable and welcoming – places for both high culture and popular enjoyment.

West Kowloon development design by Foster + Partners:

West Kowloon Cultural Complex images : Foster + Partners

The seventeen new cultural venues include a Great Opera House; M+ (a pioneering museum of modern art); concert halls; and a 15,000-seat Arena with an Expo Centre below. Arts educational facilities, apartments, offices, shops and transport links are to be fully integrated, and 2 kilometres of harbour-front promenade will give the people of Hong Kong their first chance to look back at the city’s iconic skyline. A social focus is created along a new central avenue, extending from Canton Road in the east to the Harbour Tunnel mouth in the west, along which a variety of cultural and commercial activities are integrated.

Foster + Partners brings its understanding of urban design and knowledge of Hong Kong – gained from thirty-one years’ experience in the city – to create a vibrant new cultural quarter with public spaces and buildings where public and private realms converge, social and physical boundaries are dissolved, and different groups can meet. West Kowloon’s familiar street pattern will extend into ‘City Park’ so that it becomes a natural extension of the local community. This relationship is reflected in a rich mixture of colonnades, alleyways, lanes and tree-lined promenades – streetscapes that recall the bustle of Lan Kwai Fong and thoroughfares such as Shanghai Street in Kowloon.

Though the district will attract visitors for its imaginative cultural programme, equally important are the 30,000 square metres of arts education facilities that will encourage indigenous artistic talent and benefit the people of Hong Kong.

West Kowloon development proposal design by Foster + Partners:

West Kowloon Cultural Complex images : Foster + Partners

The 19-hectare great park will have magnificent views of the harbour and Hong Kong Island, and be open and accessible to local people and visitors alike. Its sculpted terrain, with dense tree planting, will provide shade and shelter, bringing the Hong Kong countryside into the city. A series of outdoor terraces and promenades will link the cultural buildings to the waterfront with vistas to Hong Kong Island. The great park also incorporates areas for outdoor performances and exhibitions. The needs of pedestrians and cars are balanced by sinking the main vehicle route below ground level; and to further maximise parkland, the Expo Centre is embedded below the Arena, combining two functions in one compact form.

City Park will achieve a carbon-neutral rating with a synergistic system of high-efficiency and low-consumption infrastructure. The low-energy design includes district cooling/heating, grey water recycling, energy recovery systems for sewage, recycling, a waste-to-energy scheme and the generation of local, low-carbon electricity. There is also provision for solar and wind energy generation.

Lord Foster, Founder and Chairman, Foster + Partners said: “Hong Kong is a great city and this project captures what is important about its DNA: the civic spaces, the squares, the parks, the greenery, the avenues and the small side streets. At ‘City Park’ we have created a world class setting for a new cultural city for everyone.”

West Kowloon Cultural Complex images : Foster + Partners

Mouzhan Majidi, Chief Executive, Foster + Partners said: “The West Kowloon Cultural District is an ambitious project to create a dynamic new district with a rich mix of spaces for everyone in Hong Kong. Our approach is to create a masterplan where the boundaries between living, working and playing are blurred, public space is welcoming and lively, and the quality of urban life is substantially improved. We look forward to carrying out further work on this exciting endeavour.”

Spencer de Grey, Head of Design, Foster + Partners said: “City Park belongs to the people of Hong Kong. What we have done is taken our years of experience here, listened to what people need and created a setting for a new world class cultural district that expresses the hopes and aspirations of the city. It will be the most extraordinary international destination – a new landmark on the world’s cultural map.”

Previously:

West Kowloon Cultural Development News Update – 20 Jul 2009:
Foster + Partners / Rem Koolhaas / Rocco Yim Sen-kee named as consultants for the conceptual plans. This project previously halted in 2006.

West Kowloon Cultural Complex aka the ‘dragon’ – $5 billion, commissioned in 1999

Massive organic-shaped glass roof encapsulates museums, concert halls, theatres, school, offices, retail, community facilities and residential property.

West Kowloon Cultural Complex images : Nigel Young, from Foster + Partners

Foster + Partners

West Kowloon Cultural District – design by OMA
Design: Office for Metropolitan Architecture

West Kowloon Cultural Complex image courtesy OMA
West Kowloon Cultural District