Neri&Hu Design and Research Office 如恩设计研究室

Nantou City Guesthouse

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

Nantou City Guesthouse 

Neri&Hu Design and Research Office

FURNITURE, FIXTURES, AND EQUIPMENT (FF&E)
Design Republic

PARTNERS IN CHARGE
Lyndon Neri, Rossana Hu

SENIOR ASSOCIATE IN CHARGE
Chris Chienchuan Chen

DESIGN TEAM
Bingxin Yang, Dian Wang, Ningxin Cheng, Peter Ye, Bernardo Taliani de Marchio, Cheng Jia, Xiaotang Tang, Jieqi Li, Pengpeng Zheng, Eric Zhou, Yoki Yu, Zhikang Wang, Tong Shu, Matthew Sung, Kany Liu, July Huang, Lyuqitiao Wang

CLIENT
Shenzhen Vanke Co., Ltd

SENIOR ASSOCIATE
Christine Chang

DESIGN MANAGEMENT
Urban Research Institute of China Vanke

LOCAL DESIGN INSTITUTE
Bowan Architecture Co. Ltd.

DOORS AND WINDOWS
Schüco International Beijing Co. Ltd.

PHOTOGRAPHS
Hao Chen

AREA
1370 M²

YEAR
2021

LOCATION
Shenzhen, China

CATOGERY 
Hotels, Renovation

Urban Village, or cheng-zhong-cun, is a phenomenon where the remnants of pre-industrial settlements are nestled amidst a seemingly modern metropolis.

Nantou City, the site of Neri&Hu’s adaptive reuse project for an eleven-room guesthouse, is an example of such an urban village.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

Situated at the heart of Shenzhen, a burgeoning city with astonishing growth, Nantou City has evolved from a well-heeled ancient capital to the overcrowded inner city it is now.

Visitors today are immediately immersed in the tightly knit alleys, plazas, and dead-ends, where residents, street vendors, unsupervised children, nomads alike roam.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

Inspired by the vibrant milieu of the alleyways in Nantou City, the project seeks to reflect on the cultural heritage of the mundane. Scenes of every day—people, objects, and their settings—are the primary source material for design.

To celebrate life in the urban village, the existing structure was cut into massing strategy, allowing such “urban incisions” to foster a new public realm on the inside of the previously private apartment block.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

At the same time, the excavation revealed the many material layers and building structures as if at an archeological site, only to allow new interventions to instigate unexpected dialogues between the past and the present.

Throughout the research and design process for the Nantou City Guesthouse, Svetlana Boym’s writings on the topic of reflective nostalgia have guided the thinking behind the project.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

Rather than simply mimicking the past for its superficial material effects, the project has sought to unearth the possibilities of certain kinds of past that could invigorate our contemporary culture.

A tectonic language was developed to articulate two divergent treatments that probe the notion of urban layering and the embracing of fragments: that of light, screen-like cladding as the major façade element, and the other a heavier, expressive assemblage to contrast as a skyline “capping” atop.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

Like the bustling scenes in the alleyways below, the roofscape across the Nantou urban village has a life of its own, with makeshift gardens and vegetable farms popping up along the jagged skyline.

To reframe views of this ever-evolving village, a flat floating roof is installed to create a dramatic panorama of the street life below, and a new public ground above.

Housing public spaces and service functions, the metallic monoliths of the rooftop play on vernacular add-ons, which are much sought after by space-starved attic-level residents.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

To engage with the uniquely organic circulation that is quintessential to Nantou’s urban fabric, the guesthouse’s access and public realms are designed to be woven back into the network of intricate alleyways found on site.

The new entrance to the guesthouse is created by extending a side street directly into the heart of the building as if to invite neighbors and friends into one’s private home.

Old and new are juxtaposed throughout the building to celebrate ruins. Once the visitor arrives at the building, the public gesture of opening up the building along the urban axis is turned upward.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

An existing stairwell that had previously connected all nine tenement floors was now cut open and expanded to create a new vertical courtyard. Natural elements are allowed to pass through from the open façades to the side and a light well above.

A new metal stair suspended within the vertical courtyard takes the visitor on a journey to the guest rooms on the mid-levels, and finally to the public rooftop gardens.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen

To cut does not simply connote destruction, but also creation, in this case, of spaces and meanings. By absorbing the urbanity into the building, Nantou City Guesthouse in turn makes its private history legible and becomes fully ingrained in the ebb and flow of the city.

In that transformation, the self-healing incision opens a new portal into as much as the past, as the mundane yet singular present.

Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen


Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen


Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen
Nantou City Guesthouse
© Hao Chen


Nantou City Guesthouse
1F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
1F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
2F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
2F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
6F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
6F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
7F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
7F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
8F plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
8F plan


Nantou City Guesthouse
site plan
Nantou City Guesthouse
site plan


Nantou City Guesthouse
original building
Nantou City Guesthouse
section

Neri&Hu Design and Research Office 如恩设计研究室
T +8621 5286 2900
Neri&Hu Design and Research Office 如恩设计研究室
322 Jiaozhou Road, Building 31 Jing'an District, Shanghai China 200040 中国上海市静安区胶州路322号31楼