Shanghai can enjoy a sneak preview of the competing designs for
the Britain Pavilion at World Expo Shanghai 2010 after an
exhibition featuring the designs was launched last night.
A visitor takes a picture
of a poster of one of the competing designs for the Britain
Pavilion at World Expo Shanghai 2010 after an exhibition showing
the design finalists opened last night.
Six teams competing to design the UK Pavilion have brought their
proposals back to Shanghai after they examined the Expo site for
inspiration two months ago.
Their creations are on show until Sunday at the Shine Space
Gallery on Moganshan Road, one of the city's creative industry
zones.
The models of the designs have just been on display at the
Victoria and Albert Museum in London and they have attracted a
great deal of interest, said the British Consul General, Carma
Elliot.
"Any one of the six designs on show could make a fantastic
contribution to World Expo 2010," said Elliot. "We're looking
forward to hearing what the British and Chinese public think."
The public opinion will be considered by the jury which will
select the winning design on September 19.
People can choose their own favorite designs for the UK Pavilion
by voting at the exhibition or by commenting on the UK's official
Expo Website www.ukshanghaiexpo.com before September 18.
"We encourage all of the designers to think about bringing
innovation into the designs," said Elliot.
Some of the designs feature interesting approaches to building
techniques and materials using environmentally friendly,
technologically advanced materials instead of concrete or steels.
And the UK organizers hope their pavilion will meet a high
environmental standard.
The six teams were chosen from more than 40 design groups and
include the creators of the London Eye - the largest Ferris wheel
in the world - and Zaha Hadid, the first woman to win the Pritzker
Prize, the world's top award for architecture.
The UK has chosen to build its own 6,000-square-meter pavilion
on the Pudong side of the Expo site, beside the Lupu Bridge.
Construction is expected to kick off in 2009.
The winning team will be announced on September 21.
Desinged by Draw
Architects, the bulding represents British urban and rural life,
surrounded by water and landscape. As well as a tea house, the
planted landscape deck has three feature pavilions which appear as
clouds over the landscape.
Desinged by John McAslan
and Partners, it shows an expedition through our national
experience of urban conditions. Within the design, there are views
and vantage points, outwards to Shanghai and inwards to the
pavilion's central event space.
The picture shows one of
the candidate designs of UK Pavilion in Shanghai World Expo in 2010
desinged by Heatherwick Studio. The lighting box like construction
rests on a soft forest in an urban field, flanked by two ramped
arms of grass, formed as ramparts under which an auditorium,
exhibition space, cafe, shop and reception spaces are
sited.
Desinged by Avery
Associates Architects, the design showcases a metaphoric public
park with a lake and an island. An island nation lives in the
island pavilion, highlighting a dynamic and inventive race whose
desire for prosperity is counterposed by a deep rooted need to
maintain their ages-old way of life and traditional rapport with
nature.
Designed by Marks Barfield
Architects, this proposal comprises eight independent yet connected
tree structures, which demonstrate the unparalleled cross-section
of innovation in modern Britain.
Designed by Zaha Hadid
Architects, the pavilion delivers the exhibiting content with two
ribbons of light -- giant, flexible, moving LED screens. On the
inside of the ribbons of light, a series of scripted image stories
are told, each relating to one of the Expo's five "Sub
themes."
(Shanghai Daily August 24, 2007)
